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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



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STUDIES IN 

PEDAGOGY. 



BY 



THOMAS J. MORGAN, A.M., D.D. 

Principal of the Rhode Island State Normal School; author of 
"Educational Mosaics." 



What better, what greater service can we of to-day 

RENDER the REPUBLIC THAN TO INSTRUCT AND TRAIN THE 

YOUNG? — Cicero. 






BOSTON : 

SILVER, BURDETT & COMPANY, 

50 Bromfield Street. 

1889. 



Lb WIS 



Copyright, 1888, 
By Silver, Burdett & Co. 



Presswork by Berwick & Smith, Boston, Mass. 



TO 

THE MANY WHO HAVE BEEN MY PUPILS 

IN THE 

NORMAL SCHOOLS AT PERU, NEBRASKA ; POTSDAM, NEW YORK ; 

PROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND, 

THIS VOLUME 

IS 

AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED. 



Man, it is within yourself, it is in the inner sense of your power, 
that resides nature's instrument for your development. 

Pestalozzi. 

The price of retaining what we know is always to seek to know 
more. We preserve our learning and mental power only by increasing 
them. Henry Darling. 

In fact, what we learn at school and in college is but the founda- 
tion of the great work of self-instruction and mutual instruction with 
which the real education of hfe begins when what is commonly called 
the education is finished. Edward Everett. 

Patience, diligence, quiet, and unfatigued perseverance, industry, 
regularity, and economy of time, as these are the dispositions I would 
labor to excite, so these are the qualities I would warmly commend. 

Hannah More. 

Whatever I have tried to do in life, I have tried with all my heart 
to do well. Charles Dickens. 



PREFACE. 



Plato has said that "man cannot propose a higher and 
holier object for liis study than education and all that pertains 
to education." One of the most fascinating phases of the 
subject is that which relates to the work of teaching. Nothing 
so prevents monotony and drudgery in the schoolroom as a lively 
interest, on the part of the teacher, in the philosophy of his 
work. 

One of the interesting signs of the times is the rapid increase 
in our country of pedagogical literature, either as translations 
from foreign languages, or as original productions of American 
auth"ors. This indicates a growing popular interest in the great 
question of the proper education of American youth. 

This volume is the outgrowth of a good many years of 
observation, reading, thinking, and experience, and the author 
hopes that, while consisting of mere "studies," it may yet be 
considered as at least an earnest efifort to contribute toward the 
promotion of higher ideals of education and better methods of 
teaching. 

The author acknowledges his indebtedness to the writings of 
Rousseau, Comenius, Compayr6, Fitch, Tate, Jacob Abbott, 
Page, Joseph Payne, Rosenkranz, Froebel, W. T. Harris, and 
many others. He takes especial pleasure in acknowledging his 
obligations to two former teachers, E. G. Robinson, d.d., 
LL.D., now president of Brown University, and M. B. Ander- 
son, LL.D., president of the University of Rochester. He 
acknowledges also the courtesy of Dr. William A. Mowry, 
editor of " Education," for the privilege of using certain, matter 
here which was formerly prepared for his magazine. 

5 



6 PREFACE. 

He was glad to find in Compayr6's Lectures on Pedagogy, 
translated by Professor W. H. Payne, apian of treatment similar 
to the one that he had already adopted. 

He takes this occasion to express his appreciation of the 
kind reception accorded by the critics and the public generally 
to his first volume, Educational Mosaics. 



<^^iry>ia^ Q^. /^inr^^9a^ 



Providence, Rhode Island, 
March, 1889. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

I. — Education 9 

II. — Training 19 

III. — Training the Senses 41 

IV. — Training the Imagination 51 

V. — Training to Think 63 

VI. — Training the Sensibilities ^^ 

VII. — Training in Language 95 

VIII. — Training the Will iii 

IX. — Training to Learn 125 

X. — Training in Music 145 

XI. — Training to Use Books 157 

XII. — Training for Freedom 167 

XIII. — Methodology 179 

XIV. — The Man and his Method 191 

XV. — Method in Questioning 199 

XVI. — Method of Teaching Arithmetic . • . 215 

XVII. — Examinations 239 

XVIII. — The Ideal Schoolmaster 253 



8 CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

XIX. — The True Function of a Normal School . 277 

XX. — Advice to Young Teachers 311 

1. The Teacher's Calling 313 

2. The Significance of Difficulties . . 319 

3. Independent Thinking 321 

4. Culture, Citizenship, Character . . 326 

5. The Work of the Primary Teacher . 331 

6. The Teacher's Growth 334 

7. Training for Citizenship 338 

8. A Professional Spirit 341 

9. Character Building 343 

10. A Plea for the Public Schools . . . 348 



I. 

EDUCATION. 



The attainment of perfect manhood as the actuahzation of the 
freedom essential to mind constitutes the nature of education in 
general. J. K. F. Rosenkranz. 



Education is the process of making individual men participators 
in the best attainments of the human mind in general; namely, in 
that which is most rational, true, beautiful, and good. 

William Whewell. 



The object of the science of education is to render the mind the 
fittest possible instrument for discerning, applying, or obeying the 
laws under which God has placed the universe. 

Francis Wayland. 



The true end of education is to unfold and direct aright our 

whole nature. Its office is to call forth powers of every kind — power 

of thought, affection, will, and outward action; power to observe, to 

reason, to judge, to contrive; power to adopt good ends firmly, and to 

pursue them effectively; power to govern ourselves, and to influence 

others; power to gain and to spread happiness. 

W. E. Channing. 



Studies in Pedagogy. 



I. 

EDUCATION. 

The aim of education is to give to the individual all the perfection 
of which he is susceptible. — Immanuel Kant. 

In the most general sense education is that which 
marks the difference between what a child is by 
nature at birth and that which he becomes by 
growth, training, and experience. In this sense the 
vital process of evolution by which the germinal 
power — body, mind, will — becomes unfolded and 
brought to maturity is a part of education. In this 
sense the word embraces as one of the greatest 
forces of education. Nature, including soil, climate, 
scenery, etc. The entire environment, nature, home, 
society, etc. etc., is one vast educational agency. 
The influence exerted upon the child by these varied 
and diverse forces are so intimately blended with the 
conscious efforts of teachers to train and instruct 
him, that it is impossible to separate them except in 
thought. The manner of the teacher is as potent 
with his pupils as his word, and his example out- 
weighs his precepts. 

II 



12 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

Ordinarily, however, we mean by education the 
effect produced upon the young mind by those who 
purposely seek to influence him. Especially, and in 
a still narrower sense, education is restricted to the 
direct influence of school-teachers and schools. 

We sometimes say of a man who is not a school- 
man that he is uneducated, or, at least, self-educated. 
But this is unphilosophical. No man who has 
acquired knowledge and strength or skill is unedu- 
cated ; and every man who has either knowledge, 
skill, or power is in a very real sense self-educated, 
however much help he may have received from 
others. This will be made more evident by what 
follows. 

I. Education implies knowledge. An educated 
man is a man who knows. Knowledge is either a 
means to an end, or an end in itself. Very many 
facts involved in trades, and even in the learned 
professions, are acquired, not for their own sake, but 
for the sake of the use that the learner can make of 
them. On the other hand knowledge may be acquired 
simply for the sake of knowing it. The man is more 
highly educated who loves truth for its own sake, 
studies simply for the sake of knowing, seeks rather 
to comprehend knowledge as science than as means 
to some practical end. Practical education, industrial 
education, must ever be regarded as lower than a 
liberal training or philosophical culture. It can 
make no difference in what way knowledge is 
acquired, whether from consciousness, reflection, 
observation, books, or teachers, provided onlv that 



EDUCATION. 13 

one be certain that he has it. To know a thing is to 
be certain of it. The Indian, who by personal observa- 
tion has acquainted himself with the forms, habitats, 
and habits of wild animals about him, so that he 
knows them, is so far an educated man. The black- 
smith, who by experiment and imitation has learned 
how to heat iron, cut, bend, and shape it into a horse- 
shoe, is to that extent educated. The child that has 
committed to memory the multiplication table or the 
Ten Commandments with their meaning has so much 
knowledge — education. 

The practical value of knowledge depends neces- 
sarily upon circumstances. The depth of the harbor 
at Glasgow or the location of an island in the Pacific 
may be, and probably will be in most cases, utterly 
without practical value to the student of geography 
unless he should some day be a pilot or a sea-captain. 
A knowledsre of the writings of Confucius is to an 
American youth barren of practical utility, while to 
a young Chinaman it may be the one thing upon 
which hinges his appointment to office and his 
success in life. Practical education may be said to 
consist in an accumulation of those facts which one 
is most likely to need in the daily duties of life. 
There are some facts of practical use to ever)^body, 
such as those pertaining to climate, health, domestic 
economy, social customs, common forms of business, 
etc. The rudiments of reading, writing, spelling, 
language, geography, arithmetic, physiology, civics, 
and histor}' enter so largely into the common inter- 
course and occupations of ever}'day life that a man 



14 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

living in the midst of society who is ignorant of 
these can hardly be said to be an educated man, 
whatever his attainments in other directions. In 
addition to this general knowledge the farmer needs 
to know facts about farming, the tailor about tailoring, 
the sailor about navigation, and the lawyer about law 
and codes of procedure. 

For purposes of general education one should have 
an acquaintance with those branches of knowledge 
which are of most general interest, which give to one 
the highest topics of thought. The chief facts and 
general principles of art, literature, science, politics, 
and religion make up a body of knowledge that is 
essential to a liberal education. 

Exhaustive knowledge in any department of human 
investigation is scarcely attainable by the specialist 
even, and is utterly beyond the reach of the many, 
while cyclopaedic knowledge is but the dream of an 
enthusiast. 

2. Education involves mental power. 

The soul at birth contains certain great possibilities, 
latent forces, which, by exercise, experience, culture, 
are to be educated, drawn out. Education is the 
evolution of the hidden germ, the unfolding of latent 
power, the calling into active exercise of the capacity 
to feel, know, reason, and act. It is putting the 
myriad-sided soul into contact with the myriad-sided 
universe, so as to bring it to self-consciousness. It 
is the investment of the soul with the vast realm of 
thought, feeling, action, power, authority, dignity, and 
enjoyment, to which it is rightful heir. Man is God's 



EDUCATION. 15 

image, gifted with powers and prerogatives second 
only to his own. Education is that process by whicli 
God actualizes in the soul the lofty conceptions 
embodied in his thought of man : the liberation from 
the crude, rough-hewn marble of the imprisoned 
angel: the elaboration into form and imperishable color 
of the rude sketch on the canvas : the condensation 
of mist, cloud, and rain into one vast ocean, whose 
mighty currents thrill at the touch of his fingers 
with deep resounding roar, which is joyous with his 
praises, and from whose surface, in sunshine and in 
storm, is reflected the glory of his own countenance. 
The uneducated, undeveloped soul is little removed 
from the clod, scarcely better than the brute, merely 
a foreshadowing, a dim, vague prophecy of itself as 
matured. Helpless, ignorant, unconscious, it is an 
object of pity. As an untutored savage, delighting 
in the low pleasures of mere animal existence, 
ignorant of fire and tools, without means of com- 
munication beyond a few signs and a limited jargon, 
with neither literature, philosophy, nor religion ; 
homeless and Godless, the sport of the elements, 
and the victim of disease ; naked, filthy, lazy, cruel, 
and bloodthirsty, he sinks below pity to become an 
object of abhorrence and contempt. 

The man who can use his faculties in acquiring 
knowledge, in thinking and in expressing his thought, 
is so far an educated man. Facility in the use of 
mental powers, accuracy in observing, tenacity of 
memory, correctness of judgment come from prac- 
tice. Every one must learn to employ his powers 



l6 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

aright. This is education. Abraham Lincohi, in 
the struggle for existence during his frontier life, 
in the sharp conflict with rivals and opponents in 
political and legal contests, and in his study of Euclid, 
learned to think and to clothe his thought in forcible 
English. This education fitted him to become the 
nation's leader in the hour of its great peril. 

The student engaged in solving problems, analyzing 
sentences, investigating phenomena, writing essays, 
learns to use his mental powers, and so is educated. 

The mother, busied in the practical duties of the 
home, in the management of, and providing for, her 
household, learns to use her mental powers. She 
observes, reflects, remembers, imagines, reasons, 
talks, and argues, and thus calls into exercise, to a 
limited degree perhaps, but really, all her faculties, 
and so acquires that power of using her mental 
endowments which is of the very essence of edu- 
cation. 

The pupil that in school is content with memoriz- 
ing facts, dates, definitions, rules, principles, which 
he takes on authority without using any power but 
memory, may be educated in the sense of having, so 
to speak, a knowledge of what he has learned, or 
perhaps of having a trained memory, but he is not 
educated in the higher sense of having a trained 
mind. His power to observe, to think, and to reason 
is not necessarily called into action. 

Education does not create : it can only unfold or 
draw out. It evolves what is involved by the Creator. 
It may increase the efficiency of the native endow- 
ments, but it does not add to their number. 



EDUCATION. 17 

The possibility of the development of the faculties 
by education is limited. Education is not omnipo- 
tent. The differences among men are not simply 
differences of culture. They are inherited differ- 
ences, and cannot be effaced by any system of train- 
ing any more than a pear-tree can be converted into 
a grapevine by cultivation. 

3. Education involves the proper use of the 
sensibilities and conscience. The power to feel is as 
much an original endowment as the power to know, 
and is quite as susceptible to education. The heart 
is bigger than the head and plays a larger part in 
life's drama. No education is complete that fails to 
train the moral nature. 

Men differ widely in the range of their sympathies. 
One is interested in the welfare of himself alone, 
anotlier embraces in the scope of his interest only 
his family, kindred, and neighbors, while still another 
thinks nothing foreign to himself that belongs to 
humanity. 

The range of enjoyment varies greatly with differ- 
ent individuals and marks a difference in the 
degree of their culture. The character of one's 
education has very much to do with deciding 
whether he shall find his pleasures on the low 
plane of the senses or on the higher levels of 
intellectual and spiritual enjoyment. The variety 
and intensity of his pleasures depends also upon 
his culture. 

4. Education implies a firm will. In nothing is 
the difference in education shown more fully and 



1 8 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

impressively than in the state of the will. The 
untrained will is fitful, unsteady, unreliable. Proper 
training gives fixedness of purpose, loftiness of aim, 
purity of motives, patience, fortitude, firmness, and 
sustained power. 

It will thus be seen that education as administered 
by the wise teacher seeks to secure physical health, 
mental activity, and moral soundness. Sana mens in 
sano corpore. It seeks both to form the mind and to 
inform it. It aims to secure complete manhood and 
womanhood ; to fit men and women for the perform- 
ance of life's duties, high and lowly ; to promote at 
once usefulness and happiness. It strives to develop 
self-control ; to aid the human being to adjust himself 
wisely to his environment that he may obey nature 
and control it ; benefit society and enjoy it ; serve 
the state and reap its privileges. 

To be an educated man in the highest sense is to 
be a complete man — strong, active, intelligent, wise, 
good, useful, and happy. 



II. 

TRAINING. 



A WELL-MADE head is better than a head well filled. 

Michel Montaigne. 



The primary principle of education is the determination of the 

pupil to self-activity. 

Sir William Hamilton. 



The sciences should be employed only as an instrument for 

perfecting the reason. 

Nicole. 



What a man has learnt is of importance, but what he is, what he 
can do, what he will become, are more significant things. 

Arthur Helps. 



Unfortunately education amongst us at present consists too 

much in telling, not in training. 

Horace Mann. 



II. 

TRAINING AS AN ELEMENT IN 
EDUCATION. 

We take education as aiming at the formation of faculty. — Sully. 

He who would gain a correct idea of the magnifi- 
cent Mount Ranier must view it from many points. 
When it first bursts upon his enraptured vision, as 
he approaches from the south, it seems like a mighty 
king, surrounded by his courtiers and glittering body- 
guard. To one who stands upon the deck of the 
steamer in the harbor at Tacoma, it looks like a soli- 
tary pyramid, majestic, magnificent, rising directly 
out of the deep waters of that wonderful inland sea 
— Puget Sound. When the spectator has moved far 
down the sound, and looks at it from a hundred miles 
away, the bold mountain, now little more than a mass 
of snow, flashes in the sunlight, the same, yet how 
different ! While he, who approaches its base, is 
charmed and terrified by turns, as it allures him 
by its lofty summits, or hinders him by its mighty 
glaciers. With each passing season, each changing 
day of storm or sunshine, each varying hour of 
darkness, twilight, dawn, or high noon, it presents a 
new aspect and awakens new emotions. One must 
" summer and winter " in its grand presence to be 
able to say " I know and love it." 

21 



2 2 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

So does one need to study the work of the teacher 
in its varying phases in order to understand truly its 
many-sidedness, and full significance. There is noth- 
ing in nature so grand, so beautiful, so full of absorb- 
ing interest to an appreciative observer, as is found 
in the moral world, in the sublime work of educating 
an immortal soul. 

It is the purpose here to consider not the teacher's 
work as a whole, but only one phase of it, that which 
may be called training : to explain what is meant by 
training, show its great importance, and to indicate 
some of its hindrances and limitations. 

Training is causing to act, drilling. It means 
to govern, lead, compel. Training, as a process in 
education, signifies such a control exercised by the 
teacher over the pupil as will lead him to so use his 
faculties as to secure their completest development. 
Training has for its immediate end the evolution of 
power. As treated here, it means the unfolding of 
all the faculties of the human being. The great 
mental endowments may be grouped under five heads, 
those of acquiring, understanding, reproducing, using, 
and expressing knowledge. We acquire knowledge 
by means of observation, intuition, reflection, and 
testimony. The child has been trained when he has 
been led through such exercises that he can acquire 
accurate and comprehensive knowledge with ease and 
facility. The infant and the untutored savage have 
the same faculties and the same sources of knowledge 
that are possessed by an Agassiz or a Milton. The 
babe has no knowledge and little ability to acquire 



TRAINING IN EDUCATION. 23 

it. The savage has a very limited range of informa- 
tion, and gains knowledge with slowness and pain. 
The scientist, the philosopher, the experienced jurist 
acquire knowledge with great facility, accuracy, and 
pleasure. Training, so far as it relates to the observ- 
ing powers, means the leading of the pupil to so use 
each of his senses as will ensure its highest develop- 
ment. The trained man sees, hears, feels, smells, and 
tastes in such manner as to extort from nature her 
secrets. He knows the objects about him, or at least 
can know them. The work of the trainer is less the 
giving of information about objects than calling into 
vigorous and healthy exercise the perceptive powers. 
He is not to "give object-lessons," but to train the 
pupil to skill in studying objects. 

The pupil understands the full import of the facts 
accumulated only when he has thought profoundly 
about them, that is, when he has by analysis, com- 
parison, abstraction, judgment, reasoning, etc., com- 
prehended them in their parts, relations, uses, history, 
etc. The difference between telling and training, can 
perhaps not be illustrated better than by reference to 
the thinking powers. It is one thing to communicate 
to a pupil the results of thinking, and quite another 
to train him to think. There are several stages or 
states of the intellect in relation to knowledge. 
They may be illustrated by an example from geome- 
try. One child may commit to memory the proposi- 
tion that " the sum of the squares described on the 
two sides of a right-angled triangle are equal to the 
square described on the hypothenuse," with a vague 



24 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

notion of its meaning. Another may regard it as a 
fact which he clearly apprehends, and accepts on 
authority. A third may not only believe it to be 
true, but may be able to follow the line of reasoning, 
step by step, from the beginning to the " Q. E. D." 
A fourth may devise a method of proof of his own ; 
while a fifth, observing the triangle, may divine the 
truth, state the proposition, and originate the demon- 
stration of it. Training aims to lead the pupil to this 
highest stage, where he not only sees facts, but so 
brings to bear upon them his powers of thought as to 
comprehend them. ICnowledge, thus acquired and 
mastered by the understanding, can be reproduced by 
the memory and the imagination. Training seeks to 
render the memory facile, retentive, accurate, com- 
prehensive, and ready, and the imagination vivid and 
true to nature. 

But knowledge has a practical value. It can be 
applied to the mechanical industries and to the fine 
arts. The mind has been trained when it can make 
a ready application of its accumulated store of knowl- 
edge to the daily needs of life. All education should, 
in a sense, be industrial. That is, the pupil, who is 
trained rather than taught, is led to see that books 
are only keys to nature. Botany is only the study of 
plants, and enables him to understand and use the 
things that grow in his field and garden. History 
gives him a clearer understanding of his neighbors 
and makes him a better citizen. Training trans- 
mutes knowledge into wisdom, science into skill, 
philosophy into fact. 



TRAINING IN EDUCATION. 25 

One of the highest achievements of the human 
soul is that of expressing, in appropriate language, 
its knowledge and thoughts of facts and principles 
and their relations. Next, certainly, to the power of 
thought is the power of language. Ability to express 
thought and emotion, so as to convey to others the 
exact state of one's mind, and to awaken in them 
corresponding states, is very unusual even among 
educated people. Composition clear, forcible, pleas- 
ing ; correct description, accurate narration, con- 
vincing argument and persuasive appeal, elegant 
conversation, and winning oratory are accomplish- 
ments possessed by few. Training aims to call the 
powers into exercise, so that the student can both 
write and speak well. One may parse correctly and 
speak incorrectly ; may be well versed in the princi- 
ples of rhetoric and have little power of language ; 
may understand all the moods of the syllogism and 
be able neither to convince nor persuade. Training 
gives him mastery over that subtlest of instruments, 
human speech. 

Training seeks to lead the pupil through such 
exercises or operations as will tax each of the powers, 
or faculties, and not one only. The soul is endowed 
with sensibility, conscience, and will as well as with 
intellect. A fully developed soul, that is, a well- 
trained soul, not only knows but feels and not only 
feels but acts. The appetites, desires, affections, and 
emotions are as much integral parts of the soul as 
thoughts or volitions. 

I may illustrate the difference between teaching 



26 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

and training by describing a scene. I once witnessed 
in a college classroom. The teacher was the hon- 
ored president of the institution, a man renowned for 
learning and venerable in years and character. His 
pupils were seniors. The subject, ethics. With a 
book open before him, he questioned the students 
one by one as to what was said on the various parts 
of the subject under consideration, while he recorded 
the marks to correspond with the answers. During 
the period of half an hour I think I heard no single 
recitation that indicated anything more than a feeble 
effort at mere recollection. There was not only no 
attempt at independent thinking, but there was not 
even a show of a serious endeavor to master the 
thought of the author. Meanwhile these students of 
ethics were . indulging in most ;/«ethical conduct, 
levity, frivolity, disrespect to their teacher, indiffer- 
ence to the subject, want of self-control and of all 
moral earnestness. 

Training seeks to awaken and regulate desire for 
society, for approbation, property, life, happiness, 
etc., together with all right affections, such as patri- 
otism, filial affection, philanthropy ; noble emotions, 
such as love of the beautiful, love of the sublime, 
reverence, etc. Training seeks for its ultimate end 
the av/akening and disciplining of each and every 
endowment, so that the soul, with all its powers 
developed harmoniously and to the highest degree, 
stands forth complete, a symmetrical whole. 

An instructor can only impart a portion of his own 
limited store of knowledge ; one who causes to learn 



TRAINING IN EDUCATION. 2/ 

may lead the child to the exhaustless fountains where 
he may drink his fill. A trainer, though a weakling, 
may see a giant develop under his wise direction. 

Training then is only a part of the teacher's task, 
not all of it. He is to guide and instruct. Each of 
these is an important part of his work, and no dis- 
cussion of teaching can be complete or philosophical 
that ignores or belittles either of these. There was 
indeed a time when books were scarce, and the 
teacher's memory was the great storehouse of knowl- 
edge, and he a walking encyclopaedia ; when instruct- 
ing, or mere giving information, constituted a more 
important part of his work than it does to-day. The 
multiplication of books and the increase of facilities 
for gaining knowledge has doubtless greatly dimin- 
ished the importance of this part of his work, but it 
has by no means done away with it. 

His chief business, however, is not to give informa- 
tion, not to impart knowledge, nor even to cause the 
pupil to learn ; but it is to train the pupil's powers. 
Let me suggest some reasons for this statement. 

I. Training, more nearly than any other work of 
the teacher, meets the ideal of education. By the 
concensus of opinion among the ablest thinkers on 
this subject, a man is educated only when his powers 
are developed. Here is Landon's definition of edu- 
cation : " Taking into account both functions of 
education, we may say that when a person has stored 
his mind with all serviceable materials and cultivated 
his faculties to such an extent that he is able to make 
a vigorous use of the knowledge he possesses ; when 



2 8 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

his moral power has become so developed and expe- 
rienced that he not only has a delicate appreciation 
of duty but his conscience gives its sanction to that 
which his intelligence dictates ; when his will has 
been strengthened to such a degree that he is 
enabled to act with decision and bear with constancy 
the strain of difficulty and disappointment ; when he 
recognizes his relationship to a Superior Being and 
realizes that his every action may have an influence 
not only for time but for eternity ; and lastly, when 
his mind has acquired such susceptibility to the 
beauties both of nature and of art that it adds to his 
pleasures and softens his cares, — then he is edu- 
cated." The underlying thought in this is develop- 
ment, or such an unfolding of the powers of an 
individual as can come only from exercise. The 
direction of this exercise by the teacher, which 
results in this exalted state of the pupil, is what is 
meant by training. No other part of his work so 
nearly corresponds to the high ideal of education as 
this. 

2. There can be no successful work of instruction 
without a preliminary work of training. All our 
knowledge of the external world comes to us through 
the senses. Knowledge is primarily immediate, con- 
scious contact of the soul with things. Ideas result 
from sense impressions. Thoughts spring up from 
the contemplation of things. The mind must appre- 
hend from its own inherent energies. Every act of 
acquisition is an act of mental exercise. It is by this 
use of its varied powers of perception that the mind 



TRAINING IN EDUCATION. 29 

increases in capacity and strength. The elements of 
knowledge, ideas of form, color, size, weight, exten- 
sion, odors, tastes, etc., must of necessity be intuitive, 
that is, must come by observation of things. They 
cannot come by verbal description. Instruction 
cannot convey them. Elementary ideas must be 
awakened in the mind by presenting the appropriate 
objects. Training the observing powers underlies, 
therefore, all instruction. It is fundamental, a con- 
dition precedent. There can be absolutely no pro- 
gress without it. 

If it should be said that the time for training the 
perceptive powers is in childhood, and that this work 
belongs preeminently to the nursery, the kinder- 
garten, and the primary schools, and consequently 
does not concern the teachers in the higher grades, 
the reply is not far to seek. In the first place the 
work is either not done at home and in the lower 
grades, or, if done, is done poorly. Every child, by 
the necessities of the case, is compelled, of course, to 
use his senses. They do indeed grow by exercise. 
But it is the common observation of teachers that 
children, on entering school, have a very imperfect 
use of these. Teachers in colleges, as well as those 
who teach in high and grammar schools, find a 
lamentable lack of control, on the part of pupils, of 
their observing powers. Besides, even if the child 
had been under systematic training in the nursery, 
and in the lower grades of school, there would still 
remain the necessity for a higher order of the same 
kind of training in higher grades. Observation be- 



30 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

comes more minute, complex, and sustained as the 
pupil advances in his pursuits. Training should fit 
him for the best work, in all stages of school life. 

Again, the acquisition of knowledge, which begins 
in sense perceptions, is only complete when all the 
powers of the mind, memory, imagination, and the 
reasoning faculties have done their work. Merely 
seeing a thing is not getting a knowledge of it. It 
must be revolved in mind, thought about. Commit- 
ting a thing to memory is not learning it any more 
than swallowing food is taking nourishment. The 
food must be digested and assimilated to be of real 
service. Knowledge must undergo an analagous pro- 
cess before it becomes brain fibre or spiritual power. 

Before pouring corn into the hopper, the miller 
sees to it that the millstones and all connecting 
machinery is in proper working order. The overseer 
does not begin to thrust his cotton into the receptacle 
till all the varied and complicated machinery is in 
readiness, so that the carding, spinning, twisting, and 
weaving may go forward together. The conductor 
does not cry "All aboard," till he knows that the 
engine is ready to start. 

Mere lecturing a child, whose interest is not 
awakened and whose powers are not active, is about 
as effective as attempting to fill a jug by pouring 
water on it while it is corked. Knowledge merely 
lodged in the memory is about as serviceable as 
money locked up in a vault. Money to be helpful 
must be in circulation in the channels of trade ; 
knowledge to be of worth must enter into the circu- 



TRAINING IN EDUCATION. 



3' 



lation of thought. There can be no effective teach- 
ing, or instructing, or imparting of information, that 
is not preceded or accompanied by the training of the 
thinking powers. 

The high function of the imagination, in faciUtating 
the reception of information, is imperfectly understood 
or appreciated. Without the abihty to form clear, dis- 
tinct mental pictures of objects and scenes described, 
which are absent in space and distant in time, the 
process of learning is impossible. The pupil's pro- 
gress will be in proportion to the normal activity of 
this great endowment. But the imagination, like all 
other faculties, is largely dependent for its efficiency 
upon training. 

That there can be no assimilation of information 
without a vigorous exercise of the reasoning powers, 
in every case where the information involves reason- 
ing processes, is equally certain. Many students, 
whose reasoning powers have not been developed, 
and who, consequently, have attempted to commit to 
memory truths which should be reasoned out, give 
up in despair, and abandon the effort to complete a 
course of liberal study. 

Edward Everett Hale says that his teachers dis- 
gusted him with the classics, and with themselves 
too. A distinguished college president said to me, 
quite recently, that he would like to begin at the 
beginning of his education and go over the entire 
course. " But," said he, " I would like to begin by 
shooting some of my early teachers, who so discour- 
aged me that at one time I abandoned the idea of 



32 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

going to college." Such experiences are not rare. 
It is very common for teachers to accept memoriter 
recitations in geometry, teach arithmetic as a system 
of rules, and history as a body of facts, perform 
experiments before a class of young men, who have 
no appreciation of what they signify and no ability 
to follow the course of reasoning involved. Latin 
and Greek authors are read simply as parsing exer- 
cises, and even logic is used as gymnastics for the 
memory. 

All work of instruction should proceed by constant 
reference of all new truths to the primal elements of 
knowledge gained through the senses and to the 
elementary truths grasped by the intellect. A child 
may listen to lectures, may devour books, may cram 
his memory with statements, but unless, by previous 
acquisition, he can grasp the significance of them, 
they are all to him merely "words, words, words." 
It is only as the mental powers have been trained 
that they are able really to apprehend and compre- 
hend the instruction given. Very much of teaching 
is wholly lost because of the utter inability of the 
pupil, for lack of training, to comprehend it. No 
method of instruction can make amends for this fatal 
defect. Information can be imparted only in pro- 
portion as it can be assimilated. The pupil must 
not only consent but he must clamor for knowledge. 
There must be hunger, thirst, eager craving that 
involves the fullest activity of all the powers. Train- 
ing must prepare the way for, and accompany, 
instruction at every step. 



TRAINING IN EDUCATION. 



33 



3. It may be urged in behalf of training that it 
best prepares the student for the active duties of life. 
The common view of education restricts it too much 
to storing the memory with knowledge. The para- 
mount duty of the student is to "get his lessons," 
and that of the teacher to see to it that he does get 
them. When the child first enters school a text- 
book is put into his hands ; he is set to mastering 
words, learning definitions, committing rules, and 
memorizing formulas. Recitations consist largely in 
reproducing the statements of the book in the lan- 
guage of the author. Examinations are tests to see 
how much the pupil has remembered. Marks are 
given on the basis of memoriter recitations. Stand- 
ings are determined by marks. Students are ranked, 
promoted, graduated, on percentages of correct an- 
swers given to questions involving chiefly an exercise 
of memory. The arrangement of our schoolhouses, 
the organization of our schools, the size of the classes, 
the number of teachers, the character of our school- 
books, the kind and quantity of apparatus, the 
machinery of supervision, and the employment of 
teachers, all are in many instances dominated by this 
idea. Education is knowledge. A child is educated 
when he is made acquainted with certain facts. Now 
what results .'' Much of the knowledge gained is 
soon forgotten. Much of it is of such a nature that 
it awakens little or no interest. The work is done 
perfunctorily, the student expending upon it the 
minimum of energy. When he leaves off school, he 
leaves off learninsf. Much of what he carries with 



34 



STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 



him has no relation to practical life, or if it has, he 
fails to see that relation and is unable to apply his 
knowledge. 

Hence the criticism that the schools are not prac- 
tical, that they do not fit students for life's everyday 
duties. I need not say that much of this criticism is 
narrow and ill-founded and does not harmonize with 
the facts. Nor need I say that the characterization 
here given is by no means universally true. There 
is much admirable teaching, there are multitudes 
of good schools, there are thousands of successful 
teachers. It nevertheless remains true that the evil 
here spoken of is real and widespread and calls 
loudly for remedy. This remedy is found in part 
in the theory here advocated that teaching should 
consist rather in training, and aim at power more 
than at information. The mischievous aphorism that 
" knowledge is power " should be replaced by truer 
theories. Knowledge may generate power, but it 
does not necessarily do so. We may reach power by 
means of knowledge. Knowledge is only a means 
to an end, it is not the end. It is the instrument of 
power, not the power itself. It is but the fulcrum 
or the lever to which power is applied. The power 
resides in the mind. Knowledge is valuable chiefly 
as an agency for generating mental energy. 

The great test in life is rather what a man can do 
than what he knows. Can he use his eyes .'' Has he 
good judgment .-' Is he a man of commonsense .'' Can 
he think .'' Does he reason correctly .■* Has he power 
of adaptation ? Can he organize .-• Has he executive 



TRAINING IN EDUCATION. 35 

force? Is he practical? These are the test questions 
that are put to the graduates of our schools. Can 
the sweet girl graduate cook a dinner, sweep a room, 
or superintend a house ? Does she have an intelli- 
gent interest in passing events ? Has she robust 
health, good habits, self-reliance, energy, and power 
of endurance ? Can the young man lay aside his 
diploma and keep his father's accounts, write an 
article for the newspaper, make a business trip to 
Chicago, give an intelligent account of the morning 
news ? Can he lend a hand at home, and turn to 
some good account in the daily duties of life some 
of the accumulated stores of knowledge amassed in 
years of study ? Does his education render him 
more industrious, more skilful and efficient, more 
ingenious, more persistent, more practically master- 
ful i-n whatever he undertakes ? 

If he has been trained to use his senses, to 
acquaint himself with natural phenomena at first 
hand; if he has been taught to think, to make careful 
comparison, noting essential differences and signifi- 
cant similarities, making patient inductions and wise 
generalizations ; if he has been led to form fixed 
habits of thoughtfulness, Self-reliance, moral earnest- 
ness, inflexibility of purpose, persistent industry, 
promptness, punctuality, fidelity, unswerving devo- 
tion to duty ; if, in short, as a result of his school life, 
his training has produced a well-rounded character, 
he will be able to meet all the reasonable demands 
that society can make upon one who lacks practical 
experience in actual business. He will readily 



36 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

acquire skill and efficiency in any calling for which 
his special talents have fitted him. Training gives 
potency to all the soul's possibilities. 

4. The emphasis thus laid upon training gives 
dignity to the profession of teaching. Those who 
regard the work of the teacher as consisting chiefly 
in hearing lessons, or in seeing that pupils commit 
certain things to memory, or at best in explaining 
the hard points and giving information, require only 
a minimum of qualification in the teacher. Any one 
can teach who knows enough. The measure of 
teaching ability is knowledge. Many of the exami- 
nations of teachers are simply a quest after the 
contents of the memory. The remark is often made 
that "it does not require much scholarship to teach 
our school : we have no advanced pupils." The wages 
paid to teachers and the estimate placed upon their 
work is determined by the same low standard. 
Especially is the evil effect of this mischievous 
notion seen in the kind of teachers often selected for 
primary schools. 

The children, being young, are necessarily very 
ignorant, consequently any person who has even the 
rudiments of a common school education is supposed 
to be capable of teaching them. 

When, however, the work of the teacher is viewed 
as that of a trainer, one who is charged, not with the 
duty of simply acquainting the pupils with a few 
elementary facts in spelling, reading, writing, etc., 
but is intrusted with the all-important work of 
calling into healthful exercise all the latent powers 



TRAINING IN EDUCATION. 



Z7 



of the pupil, of forming his habits and molding his 
character, it takes on a new aspect. That this latter 
view is higher than the former is seen from the 
following. 

The work is much more complex. It involves all 
that is involved in the other and much besides. The 
trainer is to impart information, see that the memory 
is stored with knowledge, and that this knowledge is 
digested, assimilated, and the mental energy gener- 
ated by it is wisely directed. 

It requires a more thorough acquaintance with the 
mind and its laws of development. One who is to 
be a trainer of the mind must be a psychologist. A 
fireman may do his work by simply shoveling the 
coal into the open mouth of the furnace, but the 
engineer must needs know the parts and powers of 
his engine. 

It requires of the teacher a wider range of knowl- 
edge, more ingenuity, greater persistence, a more 
careful adaptation of means to ends, and more gen- 
erous sympathies. It kindles in him a nobler enthu- 
siasm in his work. He ceases to be a drudge, a 
packhorse, a retailer of other men's thoughts, and 
becomes an artist, a co-worker with God, in calling 
into exercise all that is noblest and best in that 
grandest of the Creator's handiwork, a human soul. 
His work borrows a glory from the higher world. 

That there are hindrances to the realization of this 
ideal is too evident to every experienced teacher. 
The diversity of minds to be trained, the dreadful 
forces operating to nullify his efforts, the evident 



^S STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

sluggishness and perverseness of childhood, the low 
state of public opinion, the unreasonable demands 
made upon his time, the inadequacy of rewards, and 
the lack of facilities, all tend to hinder his work, chill 
his ardor, and lead him to content himself with 
following in the easier path of lesson hearing. 

Only a word can be suggested here as to method. 
He who would be a trainer needs first to study pro- 
foundly the child as a most complex organism of 
body and soul strangely combined. He must begin 
his work by physical training, so that the body may 
be not only healthy, vigorous, beautiful, but become 
obedient to the slightest behest of the soul, at once 
its home, its refuge, its protector, its servant, its 
messenger, its mirror. The mind acquires skill by 
mastery over the body. The will, that great autocrat, 
that mighty monarch, the conquering hero that 
organizes armies, rules nations, overthrows king- 
doms, founds empires, asserts its supremacy over the 
seas, and subdues to its control the mighty forces of 
nature, begins its career by self-conquest. Its first 
victories are victories over the body in which it 
dwells. " He that ruleth his own spirit is greater 
than he that taketh a city." 

The great laws of method in training the powers 
of the soul may be epitomized thus. Each faculty is 
to be trained in its time, according to its own laws, 
by the means best adapted to it. All the faculties 
are to receive due attention, be trained symmetrically, 
harmoniously, and completely. The child's individu- 
ality is to be respected, and its training must be along 



TRAINING IN EDUCATION. 39 

the line of its gifts, the utmost pains being taken to 
counteract evil propensities and to strengthen weak 
points. Exercise is the one universal law of growth 
that conditions all the trainer's work. Nothing is to 
be done for the child that he should do for himself. 
Self-reliance, independence, are cardinal virtues. 
Habit is second nature. The scale of ascent is, 
sensation, idea, thought, desire, volition, act, habit, 
character. 

A few years ago I stood in the presence of that 
marvel of architecture, the great cathedral of Cologne. 
The stupendous scaffolding mounted far up into the 
air, and the great crane still stretched out its arms, 
as it had done for so long, to receive the precious 
burden. The click of the tools of five hundred work- 
men was heard day by day as the work went on. A 
few months later, in the presence of the emperor and 
before the eyes of all Europe, the cross was placed 
on the pinnacle of the spire, five hundred feet above 
the ground, and the great structure was complete. 
The cannon thundered, the sonorous organs sounded 
out their jubilee, the choirs chanted the Te Deum, 
and the vast throng uttered a solemn and joyous 
"Amen." Centuries ago the architect drew his 
plan and the workmen laid deep the foundations. 
Ages came and went ; dynasties rose and fell ; gener- 
ations passed away ; workmen perished, and one 
master-builder followed another through the centu- 
ries. Though interrupted, hindered, delayed, the 
work went on. The walls rose, the roof was placed, 
the carving was finished, the windows blazed with 



40 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

glory, processions moved down the aisles, incense 
rose, and the architect's dream of a temple became 
embodied in stone — a thing of beauty, a joy for the 
world. 

Every pupil that stands before a teacher has in him 
possibilities as far surpassing the grandest cathedral 
as a living soul surpasses dead matter. The great 
Architect has a plan for each soul. Every teacher 
enjoys the high privilege of contributing something, 
according to his wisdom and skill, in bringing to per- 
fection the plan of God and of calling into bold relief 
every lineament of that spiritual temple that is to 
endure when cathedral walls have become a " shape- 
less cairn." We train for eternity. 



III. 

TRAINING THE SENSES. 



The foundation of all knowledge consists in correctly representing 

sensible objects to our senses so that they can be comprehended with 

facility. 

John Amos Comenius. 



The first faculties which are formed and perfected in us are the 
senses. These then are the first which should be cultivated; but these 
are the very ones that we forget, or that we neglect the most. 

J. J. Rousseau. 



How is it possible that the faculty of cognition should be 

awakened into exercise otherwise than by means of objects which 

affect our senses? 

Immanuel Kant. 



Why should not every ear be as well trained as the ear of the 
musician? Why should not your eye and mine rival the eye of 
the marksman, the eye of the mariner, the eye of the general? 

Dr. Beard. 



III. 

TRAINING THE SENSES. 

Distinct and sharply defined sense impressions are the first condi- 
tions of clear imagination and exact thinking. — SULLY. 

It is a well-established maxim that all our knowl- 
edge of material things takes its rise in the senses. 
Our ideas of color must come through the eye ; of 
sound, through the ear ; of tactile qualities, through 
the touch. Each sense brings us into relation with 
a particular kind of knowledge which can be obtained 
through no other sense. The eye cannot give us dis- 
tance, or the third dimension ; that is the province of 
touch. 

Our processes of thinking, analysis, comparison, 
judgment, classification, imagination, inference, 
reasoning, are dependent upon the data given by 
the senses. If these are indistinct, imperfect, or 
few, our thoughts will be correspondingly few and 
imperfect. If the material furnished by the senses, 
the percepts of color, form, sound, taste, odor, etc., 
are accurate and abundant, our intellectual activity 
will be great and our thought products valuable. 

The senses of children reach some degree of 
activity by the ordinary experiences of daily life, 
varying with the nature of those experiences, the 
character of the environment, the natural disposition 

43 



44 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

of the child, and the quality of parental training. 
But it is safe to say that the great mass of children, 
if left to these alone, would grow up with a very 
imperfect sense culture. It is a common observation 
that people "having eyes see not, and having ears 
hear not," the most obvious sights and sounds. It 
is a serious detriment to most college students who 
enter upon the study of natural science that they 
have no proper use of their senses. 

There is need of early systematic training of each 
and all of the senses, so that a habit of observation 
may early be established and the mind become well 
stored with sense concepts. This training may be 
secured in a variety of ways. A commonsense series 
of object-lessons will awaken every sense and put 
the child in the way of observing the parts, qual- 
ities, and uses of common things. Human body 
lessons will acquaint him with the obvious facts of 
physiology, while lessons on animals, plants, miner- 
als, etc., will not only acquaint him with many facts 
of natural science, but will train all his senses to a 
keen, wise observation of the world about him and 
awaken a curiosity in regard to nature's laws. Les- 
sons in color, form, weight, size, time, distance, touch, 
smell, taste, etc., serve to accomplish specific ends in 
the general work of sense culture. 

A few general principles may be enunciated as now 
well established and necessary to be observed in order 
'to secure the highest results. 

I. The appropriate objects must be brought into 
right relations with each sense. This must not be 



^ 



TRAINING THE SENSES. 45 

left to accident : it is the work of the teacher. It 
requires thought, preparation, intelHgence, and skill. 

2. The pupil's interest must be awakened in the 
object so that he will direct his attention to it until 
the required percept is sharply defined. 

3. Seeing must be accompanied by naming. Each 
new idea must have an appropriate name, and each 
thought must be embodied in a sentence. Sense 
culture depends on language culture. 

4. So far as practicable sense ideas must be 
expressed in various ways. Colors must be mixed 
by the child and arranged in tasteful groups ; forms 
must be drawn with pencil, cut in paper, molded in 
clay, or fashioned in wood. Things, objects, must 
be measured, counted, weighed. 

5. The lessons should be graded so that they 
become more and more difficult, and tax the observ- 
ing powers more and more severely, until the maxi- 
mum of exercise has been reached. 

6. It should be borne in mind all the while that 
the great final purpose of all this is discipline, train- 
ing, power, habit, rather than knowledge ; that we 
are not so much giving lessons, as drilling. The 
knowledge is incidental, and is to be acquired rather 
than to be imparted. The learning is the chief thing. 

7. It is never to be forgotten that sense training 
is mind training. To observe well is to think well. 
One's power of observation is in proportion to his 
mental vigor and to his power of analysis, com- 
parison, judgment, inference, etc. Ideas to be of 
value must be ap^orehcnded in their significance and 



46 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

relations. The senses are trained in order that the 
understanding may be educated. Sense training is 
not an end in itself; it is a means to a higher end. 
While sense activity is first in point of time, it is 
not the goal sought for. 

8. Sense training is to be distinguished from 
mechanical skill. Drawing may be used as a 
means of training the eye. It does this so long 
as it is subordinated to the purpose in hand. 
When drawing becomes an end in itself, an art 
to be mastered, however important it may be as an 
instrument for cultivating the taste, securing tech- 
nical skill, developing invention, persistence, etc., 
it largely ceases to be, except incidentally, a sense 
training agent. 

So does skill in the use of tools, power to excel in 
carpentry, smithing, wood-carving, and other indus- 
trial occupations. In these earlier stages they are 
agents in sense training ; in their advanced stages, 
while still subserving this end in some degree, they 
become much more agencies for securing skill in 
construction than for developing a higher power of 
sense perception. 

9. The training of the senses begun in childhood, 
and carried on by means of objects, familiar lessons 
in science, etc., is not to be abandoned when primary 
work is ended. The higher stages of mental power 
need, and make possible, a higher grade of sense 
activity. The simple object-lessons give way to a 
study of nature in her more difficult aspects. The 
laboratory succeeds the schoolroom, the scalpel, the 



TRAINING THE SENSES. 47 

crucible, the blowpipe, the microscope, telescope, 
and spectroscope, and elaborate experimentation take 
the place of the simple observations. 
To apply these principles let me cite 

THE SENSE OF SMELL. 

It is quite customary when treating of the senses to 
speak slightingly of smell and taste, as if they were 
of little importance in the economy of life. When 
the subject of training the senses is under consider- 
ation little is ever said of training the nose, while 
much space is devoted to educating the eye, the ear, 
the hand. 

It is certainly true that smell does not rank with 
sight and hearing, and demands less care perhaps for 
its cultivation, and yet it plays an important role, and 
should receive its due share of attention in any scheme 
of education. 

The function of smell is fourfold. Like the higher 
senses, it belongs to the intellectual endowments. It 
is a part of the mind. i. Through it the mind is 
reached, roused, and quickened. The percepts and 
concepts gained through the sense of smell can be 
named, described, analyzed, compared, and classified. 
They may thus become the means of a good degree 
of intellectual life. 

2. Smell is a source of knowledge. Through it 
the mind discerns those qualities in things which we 
denominate odor. This knowledge it can obtain in 
no other way. A surprisingly large number of objects 
have their own peculiar odor. The onion, the carrot. 



48 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

the turnip, and all vegetables have characteristic odors ; 
so have fruits, flowers, spices, and many gases, as well 
as animals, meats, etc. The knowledge of the kind, 
quality, and condition of things that can be obtained 
by the sense of smell is very extensive. Not only 
the druggist, the chemist, the cook, but others, like- 
wise, make much use of the nose as a source of 
knowledge, having its own special scientific interest. 

3. But smell performs a highly important work in 
enabling us to detect foul, hurtful odors. The nose 
is placed at the entrance to the mouth as a sentinel 
to guard it from receiving unwholesome food. It is 
the watchdog of the stomach. 

4. A fourth scarcely less important function of 
smell is that of giving pleasure. The nose is capable 
of ministering to our happiness even more perhaps 
than the touch or the taste. One with a cultivated 
sense of smell has delights that another knows not. 
Sully finely remarks : "The cultivating of the sense 
of smell, of sensibility to the odors of flower and 
herb, pasture and wood, summer and autumn, is an 
important ingredient in the formation of aesthetic 
taste, and more especially the development of the 
love of nature, which is a prime factor in all real 
enjoyment of poetry." 

There is even a greater need for some systematic 
training of the sense of smell than of the so-called 
higher senses. The ordinary experiences of life and 
the regular work of the schoolroom necessarily give 
to the eye, ear, and hand considerable exercise, while 
the smell is called into use much less frequently out 



TRAINING THE SENSES. 



49 



of school and scarcely at all in school. Besides, the 
words expressive of smell percepts and concepts are 
far less numerous and exact than corresponding words 
for sight and hearing, so that the training incident to 
the use of language is likely to be far less extensive 
and accurate in the case of the nose than in that of 
the eye, ear, and hand. Add to this the low estimate 
generally placed upon the sense of smell, and the 
popular indifference to its training, as shown in the 
fact that while we have elaborate schemes for train- 
ing the eye in knowledge of form and color, and prac- 
tically none for training the nose in the performance 
of its proper functions, and we may well challenge 
for this useful member the sympathy and interest due 
to neglected merit and overlooked modesty. In every 
primary school there should be some special attention 
paid to the education of this sense. 

This should aim to secure first the frequent exer- 
cise of the sense until it acquires strength propor- 
tionate to its duties. It should not be overworked, 
nor called into undue prominence, but should receive 
its due share of attention till it acquires both strength 
and sensitiveness. Second, the training should be 
such as to develop a high power of discrimination, so 
that the pupil can discern quickly and accurately the 
different odors that are presented. 

Third, the growth in discriminative powers should 
be 2iCconv^2ir\.\Qd pari passu with language. Each dis- 
tinct odor should be named and the closest associa- 
tion should be created between the idea and its name, 
so that the one shall recall the other. The pupils 



50 



STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 



should be exercised in analyzing complex odors so 
as to be able to detect the presence of different sub- 
stances in the same compound. They should be 
instructed in noxious smells which indicate the pres- 
ence of hurtful substances, and should have some 
knowledge of the disagreeable odors, their origin, 
and the method of their removal. 

Boys might receive a little special training as a prep- 
aration for laboratory or scientific work, and girls in 
view of their possible duties as cooks or housekeepers. 

A few very simple principles suffice for suggesting 
a plan for carrying this scheme into effect. At first 
the work should be simple, making very light demands 
upon the sense. A few common fruits, flowers, and 
spices or gums may be used with a view to forming 
a habit of sharp discrimination, quick recognition, and 
accurate naming. The drill exercises should be very 
brief, aiming at thoroughness rather than multiplicity, 
and may be alternated with lessons in form, color, 
place, number, etc. 

For ordinary purposes it will be sufficient to make 
the child well acquainted with perhaps one hundred 
distinct odors, separate and in combination, and these 
for the most part should be of those things a knowl- 
edge of which will be of most service in daily life. 

When the sense has been properly trained in child- 
hood, and a habit of wise use established, the pupil 
will be able to call it into exercise on all needful occa- 
sions, and on the basis of this general culture can, if 
need be, secure a highly specialized development of 
the sense, meeting all the requirements of extraordi- 
nary occasions. 



IV. 

TRAINING THE IMAGINATION. 



As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. 

The Bible. 



Certainly the average child is bettered by the cultivation of the 

imagination. 

Joseph Landon. 

To inquire into what God has made is the main function of the 

imagination. 

George Mac Donald. 

To imagine in this high and true sense of the word is to realize 
the ideal, to make intelligible truth descend into the forms of sensible 
nature, to represent the invisible by the visible, the infinite by the finite. 

Fleming. 



IV. 

TRAINING THE IMAGINATION. 

Imagination is the power to recombine and construct anew materials 
furnished by experience. — Noah Porter. 

That power of the soul which we call imagination 
is much more comprehensive in its functions and 
usefulness than is usually recognized. Many neglect 
the faculty, others presume to despise it, and profess 
to think that the only training it calls for is curbing. 

Properly speaking, the imagination is the soul's 
ability to form images or mental pictures of objects 
of tho.ught. We could no more dispense with imagi- 
nation than we could dispense with memory. Indeed 
memory itself is only a form of imagination : the 
process of remembering is the process of forming 
pictures of things once seen, or of recalling as 
objects of present thought past experiences. When 
I vividly recall a past scene, such as a battle, I 
picture it as present, and see again the fighting 
soldiers and hear the clash of arms. 

It is by the use of this power that we are able to 
understand descriptions of objects, persons, or events 
that we have never seen. History is lifeless, unin- 
teresting, and utterly incomprehensible except as we 
are able to form a lively mental picture of the scenes, 
places, and persons described in the narrative. 

53 



54 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

The works of the great poets and novelists are 
without meaning to him whose imagination is inac- 
tive. Thus a large body of the world's best litera- 
ture is to him profitless. 

The student of science, no less than the student 
of literature, is dependent upon the services of the 
imagination. The search for causes must be under 
its lead. By its help the geologist, the naturalist, 
and the astronomer see with the mind's eye the oper- 
ation of forces active in bygone eras, and witness 
the vast panorama that has unrolled itself through 
the ages. 

All art is the outgrowth of the imagination. The 
sculptor, before he has struck a blow with the chisel, 
sees in the shapeless block of marble, perfect in 
every lineament, the matchless form he would liber- 
ate. The cathedral stands complete from turret to 
foundation stone in the architect's mind before the 
workman begins his labor. The painter simply puts 
on canvas as best he may a rude copy of the picture 
already finished in his imagination. Imagination is 
the servant of the man of business no less than of 
the poet and of the artist. It plans the work of the 
farmer and of the blacksmith ; arranges the details 
of the week's work for the thoughtful housewife, and 
directs all the labor of preparation for the grand 
entertainment ; it disposes all the contemplated 
movements of the general on the field of battle 
before he has set a single squadron in the field. It 
is the presiding genius of the patent office, and the 
mother of inventions. It arranges the teachers' pro- 
grammes and plans the schoolboys' sports. 



TRAINING THE IMAGINATION. 



55 



It has a high office in the act of worship, when it 
summons before the mind of the worshiper an image 
of the object of his adoration. The sublime imagery 
of the book of Revelation is the product of this 
faculty. 

By the aid of imagination rightly trained the soul 
climbs the loftiest mountain height of observation 
and aspiration. At its feet are crags and peaks of 
marvelous beauty ; stretching away in the distance 
are valleys and plains, rivers and lakes, cities, vil- 
lages, and the smoke ascending from many a happy 
home. The world seems spread out before it, and 
thoughts of boundless space, endless time, limitless 
beauty, and infinite power, wisdom, goodness, and 
love crowd upon it. 

It is thus evident that the imagination plays a 
most important part in the soul's activities, as a ser- 
vant in toil, a minister of pleasure, and an indispens- 
able helper in the act of worship. To neglect this 
power is to neglect one of the soul's most regal 
endowments. 

To train the imagination is to train the soul to 
form correct mental pictures, clear, vivid, rational, of 
things past or of things yet to be. It is to train it 
not only to seize with strong grasp upon the great 
essentials, the broad outline of scenes, events, char- 
acters, but to fill in when needed every detail, even 
the minutest. It is to awaken a quick discernment 
of fact, a profound love of truth, a keen sense of 
fitness, a ready passage from a whole to its parts, a 
cause to its effects, an event to all its accessories. 



56 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

It is not possible to train the imagination sepa- 
rately from the other faculties. It does not stand 
alone, it does not operate alone. The imagination 
is the soul viewed as a picture-maker, an artist, a 
creator. Every act of imagination is inseparably 
connected with other mental processes and cannot 
proceed without them. To train the imagination is 
to train the soul in the i^erformance of one of its 
highest functions. 

Every rational method of education must needs 
train this faculty, for there can be no real progress 
in soul culture that is not attended by a culture of 
the imagination. The use of this is involved in that 
of all the other powers, observation, memory, think- 
ing, and the proper training of these must issue in 
the culture of the handmaid of them all — the 
imagination. 

Nevertheless it is possible to store the memory 
with words unaccompanied with correct ideas, and 
thus to attain a seeming culture which is spurious. 
Students may study geography and yet have no true 
conception of the countries, their natural features, 
productions, and people, which they talk about. 
They may study history with no realization that they 
are reading about men of like passions with us. 
They may read Milton with no expansion of soul, 
and recite Cicero without emotion. 

Much of the work done in schoolrooms is profit- 
less because no intelligent effort is made to awaken 
the imagination. It is worth while to consider the 
laws of the mind's activity as involved in the process 



TRAINING THE IMAGINATION. 5/ 

of imagination, with a view to such a cultivation of 
that faculty as will enable it to do its full work in the 
general culture of the soul. 

By holding the imagination steadily before the 
mind as a distinct activity of the soul and one whose 
culture is greatly to be desired, the teacher will 
attain much better results than if it be left to take 
its chances of training in the general process of edu- 
cation. Culture progresses just in proportion as all 
the elements comprised in it are made, one by one, 
the conscious aim of the teacher's efforts. 

The soul's power of picture-making is limited to 
the use of materials furnished primarily by the 
senses. The soul is not strictly a creative force : it 
simply imitates. The painter's finest picture is not 
entirely a new creation. The elements that enter 
into it he has gleaned from nature. The grouping, 
the arrangement, only is his. 

The first step, therefore, in the cultivation of this 
faculty is in the training of the senses. The critical 
observation of nature is the indispensable prerequi- 
site to the exercise of the imagination where use is 
to be made of natural objects. The more exact, 
varied, and familiar the pupil's acquaintance is with 
form, color, size, weight, birds, animals, trees, flow- 
ers, and the phenomena of nature, the more abound- 
ing will be his resources in after-life when he wishes 
to create for himself an ideal picture. 

To insure accuracy of observation and an exercise 
of the imagination, the pupil should be led (i) to 
observe, (2) to describe objects present to the sense. 



58 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

(3) to describe objects when removed, (4) to repro- 
duce in his own language descriptions of objects 
described by the teacher, (5) to represent the object 
where practicable by pencil or crayon, or to repro- 
duce it in clay, paper, or wood. 

To be able to form a correct picture of a distant 
country as described in geography, he must be led to 
study attentively by observation the country, city, 
town, or village in which he lives. If he can first 
see and be led to describe in his own language the 
schoolhouse and its surroundings ; then to listen to 
a description by the teacher, modifying his own when 
inaccurate ; and afterwards read a description in the 
book verifying its correctness by observation, he will 
have laid the foundation for an extended knowledge 
of geography to be derived from the study of text- 
books, maps, and books of travel. 

Next to actual observation is an acquaintance with 
pictures representing objects, persons, and places 
with which he is to be made acquainted through the 
imagination. 

Preparation for the study of the history of strange 
people who lived in foreign lands and in distant ages 
must be made by acquainting him with the actions of 
the people among whom he lives. A knowledge of 
current events is the key to history. 

In general it may be said that in order to insure 
the formation of correct mental pictures, the ele- 
ments of every new science should be presented 
objectively if practicable. The beginnings of sci- 
ence should be learned in the laboratory, or in face- 



TRAINING THE IMAGINATION. 59 

to-face contact with nature. Globes, maps, pictures, 
blackboards, rightly used, are great helps to the 
imagination. 

It should be remembered, however, that these 
helps may become hindrances. The great law of 
activity rules here as elsewhere in the development 
or mental power. In order to grow, the imagination 
must be used. Description of an object present 
must be followed by description of an object absent. 
Drawing from objects should give way to original 
designs. The reading lesson must be reproduced, 
and then must come original composition. A story 
of real travel prepares for a recital of an imaginary 
journey. The pupil must not depend upon objects, 
blackboards, pictures, after he is capable of dispens- 
ing with them. Excessive reading of stories told to 
excite the imagination may result in benumbing the 
faculty. 

The imagination at its best estate is, in a sense, a 
creative power. When its activity is confined to 
mere receptivity, and there is no call for creative 
energy, the highest development is impossible. 

Pictures may be used to excite the imagination, by 
calling upon the pupil to tell stories about them. 
When an interesting event is being read about or 
related, it can be arrested at a point of interest and 
he be led to imagine the conclusion. An outline of 
a story can be furnished, and he be required to 
supply the details. 

In the process of training the imagination so that 
the mind can form accurate mental pictures, varied, 



6o STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

complex, numerous, with facility, the teacher must 
resort to experiments which serve as tests of the 
quality of the work done, and which serve also as 
valuable aids to the pupil in his work of construction. 
Among these may be named the following : — ■ 

1. Require a verbal description in the pupil's own 
language of the objects of his thought. All that is 
clearly conceived may be, should be, clearly described. 

2. He may be asked to illustrate his thought by a 
diagram or drawing. Many of the problems in 
mathematics arc insoluble because the pupil has no 
understanding of their meaning. This defect of the 
understanding, which is a fault often of the imagina- 
tion, is revealed and sometimes removed by sending 
him to the blackboard to make a drawing or diagram 
which shall correctly set forth the conditions of the 
problem. 

3. The accuracy of a verbal description of an 
object, person, or place, may be tested, not by an 
appeal to the the textbook for agreement in phrase- 
ology, which is of little or no value, but by compari- 
son with the object described. 

4. The details of an imaginary journey may be 
tested by reference to well-authenticated facts perti- 
nent. Rivers are not found in deserts, and lions do 
not run at large in cities. 

5. Appeal may be made to reason or judgment. 
Children often imagine things which are absurd. Of 
course it is of the essence of fairy stories to be 
absurd. They doubtless have a share, if not carried 
to excess, in arousing the faculty of imagination and 



TRAINING THE IMAGINATION. 6 1 

awakening a lively interest in common objects. 
Metaphors, parables, and allegories are useful as 
appeals to the imagination, but they must all con- 
form to reason. 

6. Pictures to be embodied in literature, painting, 
sculpture, etc., must be criticized by the accepted 
canons of their respective arts. A sermon must 
conform to the rules of homiletics. Nothing can 
take the place of searching, candid, kind criti- 
cism — criticism that appeals to general principles and 
descends to minute details of inaccuracy. 

7. Too much stress cannot be laid upon the im- 
portance of keeping the mind of the pupil, so far as 
possible, free from everything that tends to pollute ; 
it is quick to lay hold upon whatever is monstrous or 
unusual. Dime museums with their "freaks" do a 
great deal of mischief. But worse than these are the 
detailed descriptions of crime and revolting experi- 
ences that find their way into even reputable news- 
papers. The utmost pains should be taken to create 
in the mind a loathing of impurity in all its forms. 
So far as possible the child should be kept away from 
everything that will create or suggest an evil picture. 
" Nothing will do so much for the imagination as 
being good." 

8. Not less important is it to familiarize him with 
objects of beauty and scenes that are elevating and 
ennobling. A love of nature, a taste for pure art, an 
interest in good books, a fondness for the society of 
the cultivated, the refined, the pure, is a safeguard 
against low thoughts, unholy imaginations, and evil 
lives. 



62 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

The imagination is that power that is especially 
concerned in the creation of ideals. Whatever of 
excellence in character, attainment in knowledge, 
worthiness in deed, beauty in surroundings the soul 
hopes for and strives after results from the activity 
of the imagination. Life is what the imagination 
makes it. We are ruled by our ideals. So far as 
the teacher is concerned the work of education 
practically culminates in the formation of an ideal 
in the pupil's mind, a picture of some good to the 
attainment of which life is to be consecrated. 
Should not that ideal be the highest possible ? 



V. 
TRAINING TO THINK. 



It may startle you to learn that the highest function of the mind 

is nothing higher than comparison. 

Sir William Hamilton. 



Did the Almighty, holding in his right hand Truth and in his left 
Search after Truth, deign to tender me the one I might prefer, in all 
humility, but without hesitation, I should request Search after Truth. 

G. E. Lessing. 



By thinking we rise to the unseen from that which is seen, to the 

laws of nature from the facts of nature, to the laws of spirit from the 

phenomena of spirit, and to God from the universe of matter and of 

spirit, whose powers reveal his energy, and whose ends and adaptations 

manifest his thoughts and character. 

Noah Porter. 



The training of the powers of judgment and reasoning should be 
commenced by the mother and the elementary teacher in connection 
with the acquisition of common everyday knowledge about things. 

James Sully. 



V. 
TRAINING TO THINK. 

That we think is far too little considered or cared for at present. 

— Dr. John Brown. 

One great function of a rational being is to think. 
The universe of matter and of spirit is an exposition 
of God's thought. Chaos became cosmos when 
matter arranged itself in order according to the 
divine plan. Man's high prerogative is to think 
over again God's thoughts as objectified in the 
universe, while science, philosophy, and theology are 
man's attempt at the restatement of God's thought. 
All rational action is preceded and conditioned by 
thought. Among the highest pleasures of life are 
the pleasures of thinking. 

The difference among men as independent forces 
in life is often only a difference in thought-power. 
The ability to collate facts, analyze, compare, and 
classify them ; to study them in their relations, to 
search for causes and foresee results, so as to form 
independent judgments, gives to its possessor influ- 
ence and authority among his fellows. 

A knowledge of facts has its value. The ability 
to understand what others have thought about facts 
has a greater value ; the ability to form one's own 
philosophy of facts has the highest value. 

65 



66 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

Power to think is helpful in all the spheres of life. 
Even a slave is a better servant if he can think. 
There are no walks of life so humble that this power 
does not alleviate sorrows, gain advantages, win 
privileges, and bring blessings. Many of life's 
emergencies can be met successfully only by the 
power of independent thinking. 

In a republic of freemen where the great problems 
of social, economic, and political life are left to be 
solved by the independent voter, it is of the highest 
moment that the pupils in our public schools, the 
millions who in a few years are to be entrusted with 
the weightiest responsibilities, should be trained to 
think. 

That the average pupil in our common schools 
does not acquire the great art of sound thinking is 
evident to all who are acquainted with the practical 
workings of our system. Any mode of instruction 
which unduly exalts the memory, instead of calling 
into healthful exercise the thinking faculties, is 
fatally defective. Children learn to think by 
thinking. Memorizing is not thinking ; observing 
experiments performed by the instructor is not 
thinking ; construing Latin does not necessarily 
imply thinking. 

Thinking is a complex process and involves the 
bringing of a subject into all possible relations with 
the mind. In its highest form it calls for the loftiest 
endowments, the greatest mental energy, and the 
most persistent effort. Great thinkers are few. 
Those who are competent to make any considerable 



TRAINING TO THINK. 67 

addition to the advance of human thought in any 
direction are rare. 

Nevertheless thinking may be analyzed into a 
few simple processes, and every well-endowed child 
may be so trained in the exercise of these various 
processes as to become in a high degree an original 
and independent thinker. The chief processes in- 
volved in thinking are the following, namely : — 

I. Analysis. The first manifestation of this power 
is in discriminating one object or sensation from 
another. To analyze is to separate into parts, to 
resolve into elements, to contemplate the qualities of 
an object one by one. The mind can analyze com- 
plex qualities of concrete objects by either of the 
senses. The eye separates colors ; the ear, sounds ; 
the taste, flavors ; and the smell, odors. Acuteness 
of analytic power comes of intelligent practice. It 
is said that the trained eye can distinguish forty 
thousand distinct colors. 

Elementary analysis and the simpler forms of 
logical division come within the range of little 
children, and may be taught in the kindergarten ; 
the subtler processes of analysis may be reserved 
for advanced students. 

The plan of requiring students in the grammar 
and high schools to make out topical analyses of 
lessons studied and to prepare a careful outline of 
subjects before writing essays on them is highly 
beneficial. 

2. The second element in thinking is abstraction, 
contemplating a single quality apart from all others 



68 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

or apart from the object in which it inheres. The 
chief requisite for this is fixedness of attention. In- 
telligent counting is a process of abstraction, and 
mathematics lends itself readily as an instrument of 
discipline for developing this power. 

3. Comparison forms so essential a part of think- 
ing that Sir William Hamilton makes it synonymous 
with the entire elaborative process. It is diiificult to 
overstate the importance of the power of bringing 
objects into such relations to each other as to bring 
to light their resemblances and differences. Simple 
exercises in the act of comparison should constitute 
a large part of the child's activities. It is only by 
such exercise that he can be led to have clear, well- 
defined ideas of color, form, size, weight, taste, 
smell, etc. 

A cardinal defect in most men's thinking is that 
they have no well-established standards of compari- 
son. Knowledge of extension can be had only by 
reference to some familiar standard of linear measure, 
such as the foot, yard, rod, or mile. Weight must be 
conceived of as a multiple of an accepted standard, 
as the pound. Ideas of color must be referred to 
the primary elements of color. When a child knows 
these absolutely and can detect them in all their 
modifications, he knows color. 

The foundations of clear thinking must be laid in 
familiarity with the primary standards of color, form 
size, weight, direction, hardness, taste, odor. Clear 
thinking is conditioned on close comparison. Com- 
parison always implies definite ideas of something 



TRAINING TO THINK. 69 

fixed and unchangeable. The goal of science is the 
determination of these fixed standards. They are to 
the thinker what meridian lines are to the geographer. 
The pupil needs to have extended drill in handling 
and contemplating standards of weight, measure, 
time, money, etc. When he has been made familiar 
with these, and has facility in using them as means 
of comparison in thinking, he is well on in the high- 
road of culture. Until he knows by experience, with 
wellnigh absolute certainty, the meaning of the terms 
expressive of the elementary ideas which enter into 
thinking, he can make no progress in true thought. 
The test of thinking is truth, correspondence to fact, 
agreement with reality. 

4. Judgment is but a completion of the act of 
comparison ; in an act of simple judgment the mind 
declares' agreement or disagreement between two 
notions or objects brought into comparison. 

The mind is susceptible of a high degree of 
training in judgment as well as in comparison. The 
two chief qualities to be sought after are accuracy 
and quickness. 

By a graduated series of exercises the pupil may 
be led along from such a simple judgment as that 
" the apple is red," to that of a far-reaching general- 
ization resting upon a careful induction from a multi- 
tude of considerations. Such a judgment would be 
this, for example : "The universe is a work of design." 

The habit of forming moral judgments should be 
early established. A mind eager for the truth, 
painstaking in research, sensitive to fact and keenly 



70 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

alive to the force of evidence, quick to decide, but 
always ready to modify opinions to accord with new 
facts, will be positive, aggressive, and yet humble and 
charitable. 

5. One of the most useful elements of thinking is 
that of classifying, grouping objects into classes by 
reference to their points of resemblance. By the 
power of thinking of objects in vast groups or classes 
the mind is capable of an intelligent survey of the 
universe ; without this power it would be oppressed 
with the limitless number of objects claiming its 
attention. 

The habit of grouping into classes the blocks, 
beads, splints, and other objects which the child uses 
in the kindergarten may be utilized a little later in 
simple exercises in classification in natural history, 
botany, zoology, and thus become for the child the 
initial step into the higher realms of thought where 
he contemplates nations, institutions, processes, 
forces, worlds, under wide-reaching laws. 

6. Closely connected with classification is the 
process of induction and generalization. The great 
achievements of modern science are largely due to 
the employment of these two processes of thinking. 
Practical life owes its successes chiefly to the skill 
shown in examining particular instances and from 
them reaching a general principle. Children should 
early be trained in making correct inferences and 
wise generalizations. 

This incomplete survey of the thinking process is 
sufficient to show the feasibility of doing much, even 



TRAINING TO THINK. 



71 



in the earlier stages of instruction, to train children 
to correct habits of thinking. The child's first lesson 
in observation should awaken the powers of thought ; 
the first steps in reading should be accompanied by 
thinking ; number should be taught by leading him 
to think ; the whole course of reading should be a 
drill in thinking : selections should be analyzed, 
paraphrased, summarized, and commented on until 
he is master of the thought. The study of geog- 
raphy should be an exercise in comparison ; history 
a training of the judgment ; translation should be 
much more a thought exercise than is often the case. 
The study of the natural sciences should be carried 
on in the laboratory by experimental processes and 
not with the book only. 

Original composition, begun in the first year of 
school, life, should form a large part of the daily 
exercises through the whole course of study, from 
the kindergarten to the university. 

With this idea kept prominently in mind the follow- 
ing modifications in school work are suggested : — 

1. A recognition of its rightful place in the public 
school system of the kindergarten, in which the little 
child is brought into immediate relationship with 
thought-provoking, natural objects, and is trained 
to use his own powers of observation, thought, and 
expression. 

2. The introduction into the primary grades of a 
greater amount of oral instruction, in which the 
teacher shall aim to awaken and direct thought 
rather than to impart knowledge. 



72 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

3. Increased attention to the cultivation of lan- 
guage as the instrument of thought. 

4. A stronger emphasis of the value in all primary 
and secondary instruction of the study of nature, 
plants, animals, minerals, rocks, physical phenomena, 
and facts pertaining to society, government, etc. 

This will necessitate the wider use of the labora- 
tory for observation and experiments in chemistiy, 
physiology, and physics. 

5. An extension of drawing, molding, and design- 
ing as a means of awakening and expressing thought. 

Whatever place in our public schools may be 
temporarily awarded to industrial training, it is 
probable that eventually it will survive only so far 
as it justifies its right to exist as a culture study ; 
that is, as a means of developing the power to think. 
Here and there trade schools may exist, but they will 
stand apart from the public schools, or will supple- 
ment the work of training done in them, by giving 
to their pupils a special drill in the line of the appli- 
cation of their energy to special ends.^ 

6. A large increase in the line of apparatus and 
books of reference as aids to independent research. 

7. Such a reduction of the number of pupils 
assigned to each teacher as will afford time and 
strength for individual instruction. 

8. A great reformation in the character of exami- 
nations so that they shall cease to be so largely a 
probing of the memory in quest of facts, and become 
rather tests of thought-power. 

* See report appended to this chapter. 



TRAINING TO THINK. 73 

9. This will necessitate a higher order of profes- 
sional preparation for the work of teaching. Teach- 
ing will be studied as a science, and pedagogy as a 
philosophy. The teacher's ability to think with 
vigor, depth, and breadth, and to awaken thought- 
power in the young, rather than his scholastic 
knowledge, will be the measure of his qualification 
for the high office of molding the character and 
shaping the destiny of the children entrusted to him. 

10. Finally, in the distant future it may lead possi- 
bly to the intelligent supervision of schools by 
experts who know the value of a high order of 
culture and feel keenly the responsibility of secur- 
ing for the children of the public schools all the 
rich results that ought to flow from them. 

INDUSTRIAL TRAINING. 

At the meeting of the National Educational 
Association in Chicago, July, 1887, the following 
report was submitted : — 

The exhibit of students' work from the State 
University at Champaign, Illinois, showed clearly 
both their method and results. It comprised 
mechanical drawing in its various stages, and con- 
struction in both wood and metal. 

There were three very noteworthy features. First, 
it was quite evident that the work was directed by a 
rigid method. It was the work of the hand, but of 
the hand guided by the mind. Thought preceded 
action. The brain led, the hand followed. There 
was an order of succession, a progress from lower to 



74 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

higher. There was a reason for everything. It was 
an embodiment, in lines and material, of ideas. This 
training culminates in the solution of difficult prob- 
lems by the invention of curious machinery for the 
accomplishment of some worthy end. 

Students thus trained do not become mere copyists, 
blindly following the pattern, but intelligent workmen, 
competent to execute, to plan, and to direct. 

Another feature was the character of the work 
itself. It was well done. Even that performed by 
beginners showed signs of care, accuracy, finish. 
The use of tools may be as pernicious in developing 
slovenly habits, inaccuracy, carelessness, — precursors 
of failure, — as the most vicious system of rote 
learning. It was apparent that the students whose 
work was on exhibition had a lively industrial con- 
science as well as a busy brain and skilled hands. It 
seemed to be a maxim with them that what is worth 
doing is worth doing well. Not variety but finish, 
not quantity but quality. Workmanship, excellence, 
was stamped on everything. 

And this leads me to note the third characteristic 
feature of the work — its honest simplicity. Nothing 
seemed to be done for show; even the ornamental 
work stood for just what it was. There were no 
flourishes, no trickery, no pretense. Everything 
bore the marks of a fine moral purpose to do thorough 
work. One could not help feeling that such a train- 
ing would give us honest and efficient workmen, who, 
as architects, would not repeat the abominations of 
many modern buildings that try to call attention from 



TRAINING TO THINK. 75 

their ugliness by high-sounding names, and bridge- 
builders whose work would stand the test of hard 
usage. 

Altogether the exhibit was most excellent, and 
justified the wisdom of maintaining such institutions 
as the industrial university. 

Respectfully submitted. 

[Signed] T. J. Morgan. 



VI. 
TRAINING THE SENSIBILITIES. 



I WOULD have my children able at each moment from morning 

to evening to read on my face and to divine upon my lips that my 

heart is devoted to them; that their happiness and their joys are 

my happiness and my joys. 

Pestalozzi. 

I CALL education the virtue which is shown by children when 

the feelings of joy or of sorrow, of love or of hate, which arise in 

their souls, are made comformable to order. 

Plato. 

Inflamed with a study of learning and the admiration of virtue; 

stirred up with high hopes of living to be brave men and worthy 

patriots, dear to God and famous to all ages. 

John Milton. 

The love of the beautiful is a part of human nature, and one of 

the evidences of its dignity. It should therefore be educated for its 

own sake, as elevating that nature and increasing its means of 

happiness. 

James Currie. 



VI. 
TRAINING THE SENSIBILITIES. 

The heart has as good a right as the mind to a special training. 

— COMPAYRE. 

In company with a group of travelers I once 
visited the famous old church at Freiburg to listen 
to the great organ which gives it its fame. The 
organist took his seat before the dumb^ instrument, 
and passed his hands lightly over the else silent 
keys. At his touch they responded, now sweet as 
the notes of a bird, now soft as human voices, and 
now loud and jarring as the noise of a thunder- 
storm. It was an hour never to be forgotten, as it 
revealed to me possibilities slumbering in the organ 
of which till then I had no conception. The work 
of the teacher is not unlike that of the skilled organ- 
ist. He is to awaken in the heart of the child emo- 
tions and feelings ranging from the tenderest pity 
for helplessness to the most august reverence for 
the Creator of the universe. 

Not infrequently the teacher's work is conceived 
of as that of merely imparting instruction, or at most 
of training the intellect. But this is a one-sided and 
narrow view of his office. He has to do with the 
sensibility no less than with the intellect. He is to 
awaken feeling as well as to impart instruction. 



So STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

The soul is a unit. It cannot be separated into 
parts, as can the body. Its three great functions, 
knowing, feeling, and willing, are inter-related and 
mutually dependent. Knowledge awakens desire, 
and desire influences the will. There can be no 
act of knowing or of feeling which is not also an 
act of willing. Training to think must affect to 
some degree the capacity for feeling as well as influ- 
ence the will. It is impossible to reach the sensi- 
bility except through the intellect. We do not 
desire that which we know nothing about. 

Nevertheless, there is a broad line of distinction 
between the sensibility and the intellect, on the one 
hand, and the will, on the other. The consciousness 
of knowing is one thing, that of feeling pleasure or 
pain is quite another. The two states are wholly 
unlike. Not less dissimilar are an act of willing 
and an act of feeling or of knowing. 

These three great elements of being may exist in 
different individuals in very unequal proportions. In 
some they are very evenly balanced, in others the 
propensity for knowledge predominates over both 
sentiment and action ; in some the feelings are 
uppermost, while in others the will is the dominant 
factor. 

The ideal of human culture is that condition in 
which the intellect, sensibility, and will are each well 
developed, and all stand in harmonious relationship. 
To know broadly and accurately, to feel quickly and 
keenly, and to act with promptness and effectively 
are the prerogatives of the well-cultured man. 



TRAINING THE SENSIBILITIES. 8 1 

While increasing attention is paid by intelligent 
teachers to the systematic training of the intellectual 
powers, the senses, memory, imagination, thinking, 
reasoning, very little attention is given to the proper 
cultivation of the sensibility, the appetites, desires, 
sentiments, emotions. This is largely not only a 
neglected field, but even an unknown territory. 
The attention of the student of psychology in the 
normal school is directed rather to the faculties of 
knowledge tlian to the capacities for feeling. The 
laws of memory are much more clearly known than 
are the laws of the desires. In elaborate treatises 
on psychology it is far more difficult to find a satis- 
factory discussion of the feelings than of the intel- 
lect. I know of no books of methods for training 
the feelings at all comparable with those for training 
the senses. The "model lessons" given in train- 
ing schools are models of instruction, and seek to 
illustrate the best way of stimulating the intellect, 
and seldom refer to the culture of the feelings. 
Even books of model lessons on morals are apt to 
be devoted to an exposition of teaching moral truth 
rather than to the mode of awakening right senti- 
ments. Candidates for the position of teacher are 
questioned as to their knowledge, methods of 
instruction, and modes of discipline, but not on 
their manner of calling into proper exercise the 
child's wonderful endowments for feeling pain at 
sight of falsehood, deformity, and evil, and pleasure 
at exhibitions of the true, the beautiful, and the 
good. 



82 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

That the training of the sensibiHties should claim 
the serious attention of the educator will be made 
evident by the following considerations: — 

I. The capacity for feeling is one of the greatest 
factors in the constitution of the human soul. It is 
not practicable in a brief sketch like this to do 
more than outline the feelings, without attempting a 
detailed description. For convenience, the various 
feelings will be grouped, and the most important 
ones named. 

{a) The appetites. The lowest group comprises 
those cravings that are most closely connected with 
the welfare of the body, such as hunger, thirst, 
suffocation, ennui, weariness, etc. These are ani- 
mal, and man shares them with the brutes. 

{b) The desires. This group embraces the desires 
of life, property, society, approbation, liberty, power, 
truth, and others. This class loses its physical 
character and becomes more distinctively psychical. 

if) The affections. In this are found love for self, 
for parents, for children, conjugal and fraternal affec- 
tion ; friendship, patriotism, philanthropy, gratitude, 
benevolence, pity, and piety, or love of God. This 
group is marked by a moral element which is absent 
from the others named. 

{d) The aesthetic emotions of beauty, grandeur, 
sublimity constitute another group. 

ie) A fifth is made up of the moral feelings of 
obligation, a sense of duty, remorse, shame, and 
self-approbation. 

(/) Into a sixth may be gathered the religious 



TRAINING THE SENSIBILITIES. 83 

emotions, patience, faith, hope, repentance, rever- 
ence, and adoration. 

{g) We may bring together into a separate class 
what may be called the passions, avarice, ambition, 
envy, jealousy, hatred, anger, revenge, pride, vanity, 
and others. 

This list, though by no means exhaustive, is 
suggestive of the large place in the human soul 
which is occupied by the feelings. They form an 
integral part of our constitution and claim no less 
consideration than does the intellect. To ignore the 
feelings is to ignore the soul itself in the realm of 
its greatest activities. 

2. If a contemplation of the soul's varied capacity 
for feeling, embracing so wide a range of possibility 
of pain and pleasure, does not establish its claim to 
be considered by the educator in any comprehensive 
scheme of symmetrical culture, consider the part it 
plays in the life of the soul. Without endorsing the 
epicurean notion that pleasure is life's end and aim, 
it must be admitted that the practical test that most 
men apply in estimating the value of any experience 
is the aggregate of happiness or pleasurable feeling 
enjoyed. 

3. The brain is the servant of the heart. Men 
think in order that they may feel. They accumulate 
knowledge chiefly for the sake of the emotions it 
awakens. 

4. The feelings are a truer index of the soul than 
is the intellect. " As a man thinketh in his heart so 
is he." What a man feels, rather than what he 



84 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

knows, is a criterion of his worth. In the realm of 
feeUng lies his true greatness. The marvelous 
nature of his soul is shown by its capacity for 
countless varieties of feeling and infinite combina- 
tions of emotion. He is capable of an ambition 
that covets the world and of a self-abnegation that 
courts a martyr's death. He listens with delight to 
the sweet notes of a bird and rejoices in the midst 
of a mighty storm at sea. He spares a spider for 
pity and depopulates a city for revenge. The most 
conflicting emotions often contend for the mastery 
within his breast. The supreme command laid by 
the Saviour upon men is to love God supremely and 
their neighbors as themselves. 

5. The importance of the feelings is still further 
shown by the fact that action springs out of feeling. 
The will is largely dependent upon motive. We 
usually act as we feel. The will is little more than 
the heart's executor. If one would know how a man 
will act, let him learn how he feels. The great 
achievements of men are traceable to their desires. 
Ambition prompted Alexander to conquer the world; 
love of adventure sent Magellan round the globe ; 
love of gold peopled California ; patriotism gave 
the world a Washington, and philanthropy a 
Lincoln. 

6. Feeling issues m action, actions become habit, 
and habits crystallize into character. The formation 
of a good character, therefore, is largely dependent 
upon the right unfolding of feeling. 

7. It is especially noteworthy that in human 



TRAINING THE SENSIBILITIES. 85 

conduct the evil passions, hatred, revenge, ambi- 
tion, avarice, jealousy, and the like, play a great 
part. Vice and crime stain human annals and sicken 
the student of history. The unwelcome truth is 
often forced upon us that vice is triumphant and 
that evil predominates. 

Along with this is the other sad fact that with 
multitudes of human beings life is rather a series 
of sorrowful experiences than a succession of pleas- 
ures. So awful is the amount of human suffer- 
ing that some serious-minded men have earnestly 
contended that "life is not worth the living." 

The human heart may be compared to a fertile 
field, capable of producing fruits in great profusion 
and flowers in endless variety. Under proper care 
it yields all that can be desired for comfort and 
pleasure. But if neglected, the weeds root out the 
flowers, the tares supplant the wheat, the garden 
becomes a desert, and the field a wilderness. The 
heart of man, which is capable of exercising the 
noblest desires, the tenderest affections, the finest 
sentiments, and the sublimest emotions, is likewise 
capable of being ruled by the most depraved appe- 
tites, brutish passions, and fiendish emotions. 

Enough has been said to suggest the unspeakable 
importance of right feelings to the individual and to 
society. Language is inadequate to portray its full 
significance. Nothing more than our susceptibility 
of suffering and our capacity for enjoyment shows 
how "fearfully and wonderfully we are made." 
Only the conscious revelations of eternity can fully 



86 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

unfold to US the awful depths of suffering into which 
a soul may descend or the unimagined heights of 
joy to which it may soar. The murderer on the 
scaffold awaiting the fatal word, and the seraphic 
evangelist depicting the glories of "Jerusalem the 
golden," are types of the extremes of which man is 
capable. 

The question may here arise. What has the 
teacher to do with all this .'' The answer is at 
hand. In each child lie all the possibilities of pain 
and pleasure. The sensibility is an integral part 
of the human soul. The chords of the heart are 
all there, waiting to be swept by the masterhand. 
They can give out the harshest discords and they 
can pour forth the harmonious strains of the sublim- 
est oratorios. The original endowments of capacity 
for feeling are all present in childhood, simply wait- 
ing to be called into exercise. As the chdd grows, 
it gains no new capacities for feeling, it simply 
experiences the use of its original endowments 

Very young children manifest a great variety of 
feelings : curiosity, love of society, desire of liberty, 
desire of property, love of approbation, affection, 
hope, fear, together with envy, jealousy, hatred, and 
many others. In the schoolroom, where a large 
number of children mingle freely together, the feel- 
ings are likely to have a rapid development. 

It is in childhood that the greatest spontaneity 
and artlessness are exhibited in the manifestation of 
emotion. Men learn to conceal or counterfeit their 
feelings, children seldom do either. They carry 



TRAINING THE SENSIBILITIES. 8/ 

their hearts upon their sleeves. By word and 
gesture, tones of voice, and facial expression, they 
reveal the real nature of their inward promptings. 
As light and shade chase each other in unrestricted 
freedom over the landscape, so the swift waves of 
varying emotions follow each other in quick succes- 
sion over the child's face. 

The intimate association of children of widely 
diversified dispositions in all the varied employ- 
ments of the school affords an exceptionally favor- 
able opportunity for calling into healthful activity 
almost all the emotions suitable to childhood. 

Under skilful training right feelings can be 
evoked and evil feelings checked. Wise discipline 
awakens love of order, desire of knowledge, self- 
reliance, trust, love of the beautiful, love of truth, 
and a sense of obligation to duty, together with 
scorn of meanness, hatred of deceit, shame, and 
remorse. On the other hand, flattery may awaken 
conceit, too much attention develops vanity, too rigid 
discipline arouses resentment and deceit, lax disci- 
pline brings out recklessness and disregard for 
authority. 

The teacher unconsciously arouses, directs, or 
depresses feelings. The manifestation of feeling 
is a potent agent for arousing the same, since feeling 
is contagious. The teacher's tone of voice, manner 
of speech, methods of instruction, and mode of 
discipline are all forceful in awakening or lulling 
emotion. 

The feelings of children when once fully awak- 



88 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

enecl tend to persist and to grow. That which 
to-day seems only a harmless ripple on the surface 
of the young child's soul, by-and-by appears as a 
deep and dangerous current, drawing into its impetu- 
ous rush all his energies and carrying him on to 
destruction. An approving and sympathetic smile 
from the teacher may awaken in the mind of the 
young child aspirations and hopes which are only 
the precursors of great attainments. Many an emi- 
nent career in science, literature, art, or business, is 
traceable to some childish emotion fostered by a 
sympathetic parent or teacher. And it is doubtless 
also true that many an otherwise brilliant career has 
been prevented by a lack of kindly sympathy when 
sympathy and encouragement were most needed. 
The child-heart is very susceptible to outward influ- 
ences, and feelings are easily aroused and directed 
which may become dominant forces in unfolding 
character and fixing destiny. 

It is a consideration of great weight that there are 
opportune moments for awakening, deepening, modi- 
fying, or directing feeling, when much can be done. 
At such times the soul is plastic in the hands of its 
guide and readily yields to wise direction. These 
golden moments come intermingled with the child's 
work and play, often without any effort on the part 
of the teacher to prepare them, while at other times 
they come as the direct result of the teacher's plans 
and efforts. Happy is he who can seize such occa- 
sions and use them wisely for training to healthful 
activity the feelings that tend toward duty, virtue. 



TRAINING THE SENSIBILITIES. 89 

and happiness. These opportunities unimproved 
may never return. The iron must be welded while 
it is hot, the clay be molded while yet plastic on 
the potter's wheel, else the clay grows brittle, the 
iron hardens, and the coveted results can never be 
attained. If a desire for knowledge is not awak- 
ened in childhood, it is not likely to be in manhood. 
If a child acquires a dislike for study, it is difficult 
to overcome that dislike in later life. Love of the 
beautiful in all its varied forms is denied to those in 
whose hearts it has not been awakened in youth. 
Unless the feeling is aroused in connection with 
simple object-lessons, and lessons in color, form, 
music, manners, and morals peculiarly adapted to 
the child's capacities and experiences, and thus 
grows with his growth and intertwines itself with 
all that" he sees, hears, reads, thinks, and does, run- 
ning like a golden thread through all life's woof and 
warp, it can never come. Thought and feeling 
should grow together. Each new acquisition in 
knowledge should awaken its appropriate emotion 
and each new desire give rise to new attainments in 
knowledge. The growth of feeling is not something 
that can be neglected with impunity or postponed 
at pleasure. It should proceed pari passu with the 
unfolding of the intellect. Thoughts and emotions 
should be blended in all the stages of their develop- 
ment, so that thought may have its flowering in 
sentiment, and sentiment have its firm basis in 
knowledge. 

The tendency of school life is toward a dry, hard 



90 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

intellectualism. The goal of endeavor is knowledge. 
The reasons for this are evident. Limiting the 
teacher's work chiefly to instruction renders it com- 
paratively simple ; it brings results within the range 
of tests : and where these results are looked for 
principally in feats of memory, they can be reduced 
to percentages and tabulated. But where it is 
required that the teacher's work shall include the 
culture of the feelings, it becomes more complex 
and difficult, less subject to rules and routine and 
impossible of mathematical measurement. There is 
as much difference between the crude process of 
education that results in cramming the memory with 
facts and dates which can be called up at pleasure, 
and those subtler processes that awaken the finer 
feelings of the human soul that ennoble and beautify 
the whole nature, as there is between the coal that 
is weighed out by the ton and consumed in the 
furnace and the diamond that flashes back the 
sunlight from the brow of royalty. We do not 
despise the coal, but we look also for diamonds. 
Education must supply the child with facts and 
train his intellect, but it should not stop here. It 
is capable of far higher results, and should aim at 
nothing less than the highest. Education that stops 
with mere intellectuality comes far short of its true 
aim. 

It may be asked whether a child may not be too 
much under the domination of sentiment ; whether 
it is not possible to excite feeling too early or too 
violently ; whether special effort is not required to 



TRAINING THE SENSIBILITIES. 9 1 

Stimulate the intellectual powers, and whether feel- 
ing should not ordinarily lead to action ? To these 
questions a general answer may be returned : Yes. 
What is here insisted upon is that the teacher should 
study each child and seek, so far as possible, to train 
its powers symmetrically, giving to intellect, sensi- 
bility, and will, each its due proportion of care, and 
seeking to educate the whole nature, training the 
child to think, to feel, and to act. To train the 
intellect should not be the sole aim of the teacher, 
as seems so often to be the case. Where a child has 
an excess of feeling it is the business of the teacher 
to repress it or to counterbalance it by awakening 
some opposite feeling. Fear is to be replaced by 
love, timidity by self-confidence, love of play by love 
of study, superstition by reverence. 

There is a very general notion that the intellect is 
subject to well-ascertained laws, but that the feelings 
are capricious and subject to no law. This is a hurt- 
ful mistake. Feelings are subject to law no less 
than memory and imagination. There are laws of 
feeling as well as laws of thought. We may teach 
children how to feel as well as how to think. One 
great psychic law dominates our whole spiritual 
nature. Each power grows by appropriate exer- 
cise. Capacity for feeling, as well as power to 
think and ability to act, is augmented by its own 
activity. Another well-established law peculiar to 
sensibility is that feeling is contagious. Love 
begets love ; a teacher's enthusiasm for study 
enkindles a whole school ; disrespect for authority, 



92 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

embodied in some strong, rude boy, has a demoraliz- 
ing effect upon the entire body of his associates, 
unless, perchance, his conduct is so outrageous as to 
produce a reaction in favor of good order. There 
are other laws, easily ascertainable and readily avail- 
able, for the proper cultivation of the sensibilities. 

How shall this great work be accomplished } It is 
only possible here to suggest in bare outline a method. 

First of all, the teacher must be one whose 
feelings are sensitive, strong, and in healthful equi- 
poise. A man without a heart has no business to 
be a schoolmaster. 

In the next place, those who are in course of 
preparation for teaching should make a careful study 
of the emotional nature, with a view of becoming 
master of the secrets of the human heart. Of what 
feelings is the human soul capable } How are they 
aroused } What feelings are peculiar to childhood } 
What is the function of each feeling.-' When do 
feelings cease to be virtuous and become vicious .'' 
How can they be cultivated } How do feelings 
manifest themselves .? These and similar inquiries 
should be pursued by the study of books, by intro- 
spection, and the patient and careful study of chil- 
dren, until the student has attained a familiarity with 
this most important element of man's nature and 
has acquired a deep and lasting interest in the study. 

Third : The training of the sensibilities should be 
recognized as a distinct and important part of the 
teacher's work. Special fitness and preparation for 
doing it should be required in those who aspire to 



TRAINING THE SENSIBILITIES. 93 

teach, and success in this work should be one of the 
criteria by which a teacher's work is to be judged. 

Fourth : In the arrangement of programmes for 
institutes and other educational meetings more prom- 
inence should be given to the discussion of specific 
questions pertaining to the culture of the feelings. 

Fifth : This subject demands a more thorough 
discussion than has yet been given to it in works 
on pedagogy. 

Sixth : In the location of school buildings, in the 
adornment of the grounds, and in the furnishing of 
the rooms with pictures, cabinets, plants, and other 
articles of interest to children, increased attention 
should be paid to the development of the aesthetic 
nature. Imposing architecture, delicious music, land- 
scape gardening, fine examples of painting, engrav- 
ing, sculpture, and statuary are all suitable accessories 
of a school of learning. 

Seventh : In arranging courses of study, color, 
form, music, drawing, and other subjects that appeal 
strongly to the sensibility should find a larger place. 
One of the delightful and humane features of the 
kindergarten is the liberal provision it makes for 
training the sensibility by systematic lessons, 
adapted to the child-nature. 

Eighth : The whole course of discipline, the daily 
programme, the administration of justice should be 
such as to awaken a love of order, neatness, prompt- 
ness, politeness, honesty, and fidelity. 

Ninth : The method of instruction should be such 
as to specially call into exercise the power of feel- 



94 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

ing. Mere memorizing of set tasks has little efficacy 
in this regard. Constant effort should be made to 
lead the child to use its own powers of observation 
and to state in its own language what it thinks and 
feels in reference to what it observes. The use of 
objects, microscopes, pictures, vivid narratives, and 
good literature each has a place in any scheme of 
instruction designed to reach the heart. Short talks 
in regard to current events, comments on the pass- 
ing phenomena of the seasons, improvement of the 
incidents of school life may be wisely employed. 
Occasions presented by lessons in reading, geography, 
history, physiology, astronomy, and other studies, 
should be utilized in arousing and directing feeling. 

Tenth : The school should be pervaded by a high 
moral and, if possible, religious tone. There should 
be awakened a keen sense of honor, an exalted notion 
of duty, an unswerving adherence to principle, an 
unconquerable aversion to falsehood, a reverence for 
authority, penitence for wrong, and an honest, simple 
fear of God as maker, observer, and judge. 

This conception of the teacher's work, while 
adding to its difficulty, adds also greatly to its 
dignity. To train the sensibility so that it shall 
respond to all the varied influences that affect it 
in such manner as to multiply its sources of 
happiness and prompt it to right courses of 
action, is an exalted privilege that may well satisfy 
the loftiest ambition of one who seeks to promote 
the welfare of his fellow-beings, purify the family, 
ennoble the race, and glorify the Maker of us all. 



VII. 

TRAINING IN LANGUAGE. 



Had thought been all, sweet speech had been denied. 

Edward Young. 



The dictionary should be the almost constant companion of the 

pupils in our grammar and high schools. 

John B. Peaslee. 

It may, without hesitation, be affirmed that grammar is not the 

stepping-stone, but the finishing instrument. 

C. Marcel. 



"Whatever foreign languages a young man meddles with (and 

the more he knows the better), that which he should critically study 

and labor to get a facility, clearness, and elegancy to express himself 

in should be his own, and to this purpose he should be daily exercised 

in it. 

John Locke. 



VII. 
TRAINING IN LANGUAGE. 

Syllables govern the world. — John Selden. 

There are few accomplishments more to be desired 
than to be master of one's own language. Social 
intercourse is largely conditioned on the ability to 
express one's thoughts in choice phraseology. There 
can be no satisfactory interchange of ideas, no stimu- 
lating contact of mind with mind, without accurate, 
forcible speech. 

Even the power to think is limited by the ability 
to clothe thought in fitting language. When the 
mind reaches its boundary of expression it finds its 
limit of thinking. Thought and language are united 
as soul and body. Thought is the vivifying spirit 
which clothes itself with appropriate expression. 
Each new idea demands its suitable word and each 
thought its sentence. No language — no thought. 

Business intercourse of necessity makes use of 
language, oral and written, as its medium, and is 
facilitated by skill and hindered by a lack of skill 
in the use of intelligible expression. Much valuable 
time is lost, many misunderstandings arise, and busi- 
ness intercourse is trying to the patience and temper 
of men, by ignorance of correct modes of communi- 
cating one's ideas and wishes. 



98 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

Progress in human thought, in poetry, science, or 
philosophy, is only possible where there is a corre- 
sponding progress in the power of expression. The 
growth of the dictionary is one index of the progress 
of a race. The study of language as a vehicle of 
thought with a view to its employment is a stimulus 
to vigorous thinking ; the grammar and dictionary are 
weapons of conquest. 

One of the most unsatisfactory results of our school 
work to-day is the meagre attainment of the pupils in 
language. Boys and girls spend months and years in 
our public schools, and when they leave spell incor- 
rectly, speak inaccurately, and write with great diffi- 
culty. The results reached are by no means always 
commensurate with the time spent and the labor 
bestowed. 

This is due in large pa^rt to faulty methods of 
instruction. It is possible in the time which the 
average graduate of the high school spends in study 
to acquire a very enviable mastery of both oral and 
written language. This is not a matter of theory 
but of observation. It is the object of this paper to 
set forth in brief outline what may be done for 
pupils in this important work. 

I. Beginning with the primary grade, when the 
child first enters school he should be encouraged to 
talk freely, expressing his thoughts on such things 
as have come under his observation at home, at 
school, or on his journeys back and forth. He will 
" think as a child and speak as a child," but his 
thoughts will be his own, and under the guidance of 



TRAINING IN IAN GU AGE. 99 

his teacher he will make rapid progress in ability to 
express them in fitting speech. 

2. A series of simple object-lessons on common 
things, arranged with a view to directing attention to 
parts, qualities, uses, etc., will awaken new ideas and 
give occasion for new words. Thus daily addition 
may be made to his vocabulary. 

3. The first reading lessons should be, not from 
book or chart, but from blackboard. The lesson 
should be the outgrowth of a familiar conversation 
about some interesting object. At first sentences 
made by the teacher, short, simple, and expressive of 
what the child understands and has interest in, may 
be spoken, then written upon the board, and after- 
ward read by the child. Afterwards he may be led 
to talk, and his sentences may be copied and read. 

4. Lessons in form and color should be lessons in 
language also. For every new idea which is awakened 
in the mind the teacher should suggest at once the 
proper word, and the child should use no word that 
does not immediately suggest to his mind its appro- 
priate idea. 

5. Number lessons should be primarily lessons in 
observation and language. First the idea, then the 
name ; first the thought, then the expression. Pro- 
cesses before rules ; principles before formulas. 
Every operation should be accompanied by a state- 
ment in the child's own language of what is done 
and why. Explanations, not formal and stereotyped, 
but clear and concise, should accompany the work at 
every stage. 



lOO STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

6. In the second year the child may be led to 
observe an object, such as a cat, dog, bird, and to 
give an orderly description of it, together with a 
brief account of its habits, and to relate simple 
stories from observation, reading, or hearsay. These 
oral descriptions by-and-by give way to written ones, 
which from year to year grow in completeness and 
perfection of detail. 

7. The early exercises in composition, on the black- 
board, may be made to teach the proper use of capital 
letters, the punctuation marks, the structure of the 
sentence and of the paragraph, and some of the 
simpler qualities of style. 

8. The spelling lesson is an invaluable means of 
language training. The child may be led to think 
of groups of words, names of familiar objects, of 
actions, of birds, animals, etc. Each new word 
should be properly pronounced, neatly written, cor- 
rectly spelled ; should be defined by the child in his 
own language, and then be rightly used in a sen- 
tence. 

9. A very delightful entertainment for children 
may be had by leading them to write accounts of 
imao-inary journeys, into which they weave the 
information gathered from the geography lesson, 
supplemented by what is gained from books of 
travel, newspapers, home instruction, and, whenever 
possible, personal experience. Geography furnishes 
exhaustless materials for language exercises. The 
exercises in turn fix the facts in the memory and 
turn them to good^ use as food fur thought. 



TRAINING IN LANGUAGE. lOI 

10. The reading lessons at every stage of the 
pupil's i^rogress should be made, in the best sense, 
lessons in language. This may be done by leading 
him to give a statement in his own words of the 
thought of the sentence or paragraph read ; by requir- 
ing a summary of the principal thoughts of the selec- 
tion ; by practice in paraphrasing ; by turning poetry 
into prose ; by making a topical analysis of the selec- 
tion read ; by expressing his own thoughts awakened 
by the reading ; by being led to compare the styles 
of the different authors read. The reading lesson, 
often barren of interest to him and utterly profitless, 
may be made to stimulate thought and to improve 
greatly the power of expression. 

The frequent reading of choice specimens of good 
English, and especially the committing of them to 
memory, accompanied with clear comprehension of 
both thought and style, has a powerful influence in 
shaping thoughts, arousing lofty and ennobling feel- 
ings, and in giving him a style fluent, forceful, and 
elegant. Perhaps nothing exerts a more profound 
influence upon his command of language than the 
books he reads. Accustomed to read attentively and 
widely books suitable to his age, and to talk of what 
he reads, he imbibes the spirit of the author, thinks 
his thoughts, is stirred with his motives, and almost 
of necessity models his style after that of his favorite 
authors. 

11. Instruction and drill in the writing of letters 
of business and friendship, notes, invitations, bills, 
receipts, telegrams, etc., is a profitable exercise for 
children of say ten years of age. 



I02 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

12. Technical grammar, once a fetich, then a pariah, 
is now returning to its rightful place as an invaluable 
servant in the work of education. Even the language 
lessons which have supplanted parsing in the lower 
grades have been obliged to borrow from the science 
of grammar many of its facts and principles. 

The cultivated man needs to know not simply the 
facts of his mother tongue, but the philosophy as 
well. The English language, although not highly 
inflected, has nevertheless a philosophy of its own. 
Some account of the history of the language, the 
elements that enter into it, changes in inflection, 
variations in meaning, etc., awakens in young minds 
a lively interest, and leads to a more critical observa- 
tion and to the improvement of their own speech. 

13. Practical drill in the use of the dictionary, and 
a careful study of synonyms until the habit is formed 
of choosing the appropriate word for each idea, is, 
when it does not degenerate into puerile subtleties, 
invaluable in enriching the speech. 

14. The history lesson affords a special opportunity 
for language drill by leading to an analysis of events 
into their elements, the tracing of causes and effects, 
comparison of epochs, eras, movements, nations, and 
judgment as to character. The free discussions and 
clash of opinions aroused by the teaching of history 
are a healthful mental stimulus and moral tonic, and 
may call out the best powers of speech. 

15. The study of rhetoric has its place in the 
chain. Where this is pursued in a living way by 
the study of authors to discover qualities of style, 



TRAINING IN lANCUAGE. IO3 

and with some practice in composition calling for 
invention, tlie imagination may be aroused and the 
critical taste awakened and considerable skill ac- 
quired. 

16. The study of English literature, embracing the 
critical examination of a few and the generous read- 
ing of many books with an inquiry into the personal 
history and habits of authors, an analysis and com- 
parison of their writings, with frequent exercises in 
oral and written criticism, serves to kindle an enthu- 
siasm for literature and a striving for excellence in 
the use of language. 

17. Written examinations in the various subjects 
pursued in school can be made very serviceable as a 
training in language by encouraging the student to 
put upon paper, in good shape, without special prep- 
aration", what he knows and thinks regarding the 
topic proposed for discussion. This, of course, is 
not accomplished whfire the examination consists in 
putting down in bald form memoriter answers to a 
few questions arranged to probe the memory. 

18. Nothing in the entire range of common school 
studies, when properly taught by introspection and 
observation, is better fitted to be made a helpful 
means of language training than psychology. When 
the student is trained to examine his own powers of 
mind ; to compare his feelings and trace them to 
their origin and follow them to their expression ; to 
note the large part they play in human action, and 
their important role in literature ; to examine his 
own processes of thought, and to discern the vital 



I04 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

relation of mental energy to all modifications of lan- 
guage, he is stimulated and helped in thinking, and 
guided in his communications of thought in a very 
satisfactory manner. The study of the constitution 
and operation of the mind itself leads to the very 
fountain of language. 

19. Nothing can take the place, as a means of 
mental culture as well as an instrument for lin- 
guistic drill, of the habit of original composition. 
We learn to write by writing. Pupils can be led 
to choose topics suitable to their stage of culture, to 
gather material from observation, experience, reflec- 
tion, conversation, and reading ; to organize the mate- 
rial into a pleasing and forceful essay. Great facility 
can be acquired by youth of twelve to fifteen years 
of age in this kind of work. 

The preparation of a graduating essay can be made 
to mark an epoch in a student's intellectual history. 
The sneer often hurled at these performances simply 
betrays the ignorance of the sneerer. 

20. This brief statement of the subject of language 
training in the public schools would be incomplete if 
no mention were made of the study of some foreign 
language. Every American boy or girl destined to 
any high plane of culture should have the advantage 
of studying at least two languages in addition to 
English. 

The classics should be studied for the purpose of 
securing that peculiar phase of mental training which 
experience has shown can be attained in no other 
possible way. It im.parts a finish to the style that 
is inseparable from classical study. 



TRAINING IN LANGUAGE. I05 

In the study of the classics, in order that the best 
linguistic results may be reached, a larger use should 
be made, on commencing the study, of the so-called 
natural method until the pupil has acquired a vernac- 
ular familiarity with idioms and common phrases. 

Pains should be taken to awaken in the mind a 
lively interest in the author and his subject, and to 
bring the student en rapport with the writer. 

Translation at sight should be practised until the 
habit of depending so largely upon the dictionary, as 
is so common, is broken up. 

Reading extended passages, such as an entire 
oration of Cicero in Latin, following the thought 
without translation, is excellent. 

The grammar should be subordinate to the litera- 
ture, and the Latin lessons should be less a parsing 
exercise than a reading exercise. 

One of the most marked differences between 
secondary education in America and in France 
and Prussia, for example, is in the meagre time given 
in our schools to linguistic study. In the Prussian 
gymnasium nine years are given to Latin, six to 
Greek, eight to French. In the Reale Schule, Latin 
(with fewer weekly exercises) runs through nine 
years, English six, French eight. In the French 
secondary schools Latin has seven years, Greek five, 
English or German ten. In our preparatory schools, 
from which students graduate at about the same age 
as from the German gymnasium, the average time 
given to Latin is less than four years, and to Greek 
about two and a half. 

(See proceedings of N. E. A., 1885, page 207.) 



I06 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

Meantime it is possible to acquire a practical 
working knowledge of German or French, with some 
acquaintance with a foreign literature, and an invalu- 
able habit of thinking and speaking in a language 
different from the vernacular. 

It will thus be seen that training in language runs 
parallel with the whole course of study. Every attain- 
ment in knowledge in any direction, and every advance 
in power of thought, and every higher stage reached 
in feeling, should be accompanied by a corresponding 
increase in ability to speak and write. Linguistic 
power is both a fruit of culture and a means of 
culture. It is means and end. It is in itself a 
most worthy end, and deserves a far higher place 
in the public school than is generally accorded 
to it. 

METHOD OF TEACHING LATIN. 

In 1882, while principal of the State Normal and 
Training School at Potsdam, New York, I wrote the 
following sketch of a method of teaching Latin which 
was at that time pursued there by Mr. Shumway. 

1. With his class of about thirty beginners, of 
from ten to fourteen years of age, he employs the 
objective method, making constant appeal to the 
eye. By the use of maps, charts, pictures, and 
familiar objects, the liveliest interest in the work 
of the classroom is maintained. 

2. The child learns to associate the Latin word 
directly with the object. This is the natural method 
of learning a language. The symbol and the thing 



TRAINING IN LANGUAGE. lO/ 

symbolized go together. The thought and its expres- 
sion are learned at the same time. Words and ideas 
are inseparable. Ordinarily they are separated by 
the English expression. First the idea, then the 
English term, then the Latin ; which is artificial and 
unnatural. 

3. The next class, of about thirty (also beginners), 
of from sixteen to twenty-five, began by committing 
to memory the first chapter of Caesar. Great stress 
is laid in both classes upon absolute accuracy and 
perfect familiarity with the text of what is committed, 
thus training the memory. 

4. In both classes, by frequent repetition of the 
text, by constant question and answer, the ear is 
trained to a nice discrimination in pronunciation, 
accent, melody, and rhythm. 

5. In both classes great use is made of the black- 
board, the students being required to write, thus 
compelling the hand to do service with the eye and 
the ear. 

6. Questions based upon the text, and admitting 
of answers in the words of the text, are put to the 
student from the very first. This necessitates the 
closest attention on the part of all. The student 
must grasp the Latin question. He must think in 
Latin. He must feel idiomatic differences. This, 
long continued, leads him deep into the very spirit 
of the ancient Roman, and prepares him as no other 
process can, to read Latin literature appreciatingly. 

7. The practice of replying to the questions orally 
and in writing, of converting prose into poetry, the 



108 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

oblique into the direct discussion, and vice versa, leads 
to a knowledge of composition, practical skill in the 
use of the language, and a keen appreciation of the 
beauty and strength of classic literature. 

8. Grammar is learned first by practice. Use 
renders grammatical forms familiar to the student, 
so that error offends as though he were a native. 
Changes in inflection and order are observed as they 
occur, and by the process of induction the laws of 
change are reached. The student is taught to syste- 
matize and tabulate these changes, and construct his 
own declensions and conjugations. 

9. The student is exercised in reading easy passages 
at sight, the difficult portions being at first omitted. 
This gives confidence and keeps up the interest, and 
by necessitating careful attention to the root form 
and the inflectional endings fixes these in the mind 
and greatly facilitates progress in reading. 

10. Students are encouraged to put Latin questions 
to the teacher, and the older students put questions 
to each other in class, all mistakes being at once cor- 
rected either by the pupils or the teacher. Those 
who show the greatest aptitude are called on to con- 
duct the recitation, so as to acquire skill and confi- 
dence. 

11. The older classes study the grammar very 
systematically and thoroughly, devoting special and 
prolonged attention to the various cases and their 
significance, the ablative absolute, the subjunctive 
mood, and other peculiarities of the language. 

12. New words, as they occur, are explained in 



TRAINING IN LANGUAGE. IO9 

Latin by their derivation, synonyms, opposites, or 
their meaning is made apparent by paraphrase, expla- 
nation, or illustration. A slavish dependence upon 
the dictionary is thus avoided. 

It vv^ill thus be seen that the method is eclectic ; 
aiming to introduce the objective, conversational, 
inductive elements, and thus to modernize the 
teaching of the ancient languages, it nevertheless 
clings to whatever is good in the old way. The 
grammar and the dictionary are not cast out, mem- 
ory is called upon to do her royal work, and no 
attempt -is made to teach a language in ten weeks. 
The system is flexible, and, in the hands of com- 
petent teachers, may be used to advantage in classes 
of all grades of advancement. 



VIII. 
TRAINING THE WILL 



He who is firm in will molds the world to himself, 

Goethe. 



The unity of the self is the will. The will is the man, psycho- 
logically speaking. 

John Dewey. 

Vital moral training cannot end with emotion or desires; it must 

issue in right action. 

E. E. White. 

Motives impel the will, but they do not compel it. 

Noah Porter. 

In good education, then, in genuine instruction, in true training, 
necessity should call forth freedom; law, self-determination; external 
compulsion, inner freewill; external hate, inner love. 

Friedrich Froebel. 

Educate toward a knowledge of truth, a love of the beautiful, 
a habit of doing the good, because only through these forms can the 
self-activity continue to develop progressively in this universe. These 
forms — the true, the beautiful, and the good — will bring the indi- 
vidual into union with his fellowmen through all eternity, and make 
him a participator in the divine-human work of civilization and culture, 

and the perfection of man in the image of God. 

W. T. Harris. 



VIII. 
TRAINING THE WILL. 

Education must lay stress on the truth that nothing in the world has 
any absolute value except will guided by the right. — Rosenkranz. 

Man as an efficient agent is essentially will. What- 
ever may be his intellectual attainments or his capac- 
ity for feeling, if he is deficient in will-power he is 
like a locomotive without steam, or a watch without 
a mainspring. The will is the dynamo of the soul, 
the source of motor energy. And yet the will is not 
something apart from the soul : it is rather an all- 
important part of the soul. It has indeed well been 
called "the soul in action." It is concerned in every 
conscious act of mind or body. The babe that 
stretches forth its tiny hand to grasp the toy, or 
follows with its eyes the moving light, does so by an 
act of will. To cultivate the soul in any direction is 
in a sense to train the will. 

Nevertheless, it is not without significance that we 
speak of man as having intellect, sensibility, and will. 
This trichotomite division is suggestive of reality, of 
distinction, and of the possibility not only of regard- 
ing the will apart from the intellect and the feelings, 
but also of making it a special object of care in the 
work of education. To train the will is not the same 
thing as to train the intellect. Will-power is by no 

113 



I 14 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

means synonymous with learning. One may be a 
scholar and not have a cultured will. One may have 
many of the characteristics of a strong will without 
great learning. It is possible to secure a seeming 
development of the intellect at the expense of the 
will. So-called education may thus be purchased at 
an immense cost. 

In order to see the full significance of the will in 
its relations to human life, and to understand the 
method of its development, it may be well to attempt 
a fuller definition. 

We sometimes think of will as nearly or quite 
synonymous with force or energy. Will, in this 
sense, is closely related to physical vigor. The pri 
mary basis of all will-power is, or at least the condi- 
tion of its manifestation is, animal life. The will as 
a physical agent is evolved in the laboratory of the 
stomach ; it is proportioned to the amount of food 
eaten and assimilated. There is a modicum of truth 
in the doctrine of the materialist, that a " man is 
what he eats." This highest psychical force draws 
its supplies in part from physical sources. This is 
not to identify will-power and physical force : it only 
recognizes the intimate relationship between them. 
The mind thinks with the brain, but the brain is not 
therefore the mind. The physical force generated 
by a strong body and a healthy regime are the crude 
material out of which the soul fashions its most deli- 
cate impulses and forges its most irresistible engines. 
The developed will assumes sway over the body, and, 
as in the case of John Calvin, may long endure and 
accomplish great deeds in a diseased and feeble body. 



7'RAINING THE WILL. 



115 



Another phase of will is persistence. The forces 
of life manifesting themselves in psychical activity 
tend very speedily to flow in certain fixed directions, 
and to persist in these directions. The child has its 
favorite sports, which it pursues with tireless energy, 
and the will-power thus expressed grows by its own 
activity. It is thus that habit comes to exert so po- 
tent an influence over the will. That which we are 
accustomed to do we do with comparative ease and 
pleasure. But when life's energy takes a given 
direction from force of habit rather than deliberative 
choice, it becomes a sort of inertia, a low order of 
will-power. 

One may be at the mercy of his passions, all his 
powers being swayed by ambition, envy, jealousy, 
rage, hatred, avarice, lust, or by mere caprice. Cati- 
line is an example of a man of enormous will-power 
consecrated to evil. 

When we speak of will culture as an aim of the 
schools, we mean by will something far higher than 
mere animal or physical force, flowing blindly in 
certain accustomed channels, or swayed by base pas- 
sions. We mean a self-conscious, a self-directed 
force, spiritual in its essence, multiform in its modes 
of manifestation, steady in its operation, seeking 
always the highest aims, actuated by the purest mo- 
tives, and, under the sway of reason and conscience, 
accomplishing the noblest ends and mightiest results. 
Columbus searching for a new continent, Kepler 
seeking to formulate the laws of the motion of the 
planets, Livingstone exploring the Dark Continent, 



Il6 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

Grant subduing a rebellion, Sumner striving for the 
overthrow of slavery, De Lesseps constructing a ship- 
canal, Edison applying electricity to practical pur- 
poses, Frances Willard working for the cause of 
temperance, and Bergh struggling for the prevention 
of cruelty to animals, are examples of the sort of 
will-power for which we have urgent need. 

All the pupils of the schools cannot become 
equally eminent in the display of great virtues, and 
it is neither necessary nor wise to hold before them 
or before ourselves the ideal of fame or publicity, 
or even extraordinary achievement. What we do 
well, however, to remember is that the same high 
quality which we call will-power is demanded as well 
in private as in public, in the ordinary as well as 
extraordinary circumstances of life. The teacher of 
a country school seeking to interest, instruct, and 
train to useful manhood and wom.anhood his little 
flock, the captain of a company of soldiers fighting 
Indians on the frontier, the pioneer missionary lay- 
ing the foundations of a Christian church, the con- 
ductor of a railroad train striving to secure the safety 
and comfort of his passengers and the rights of his 
employers, the village physician in his warfare with 
disease, the widow struggling to support her father- 
less children, the youth conquering for himself an 
honorable place amidst the fierce competitions of 
modern life, the private citizen working with voice 
and pen for the promotion of the public weal, the 
nurse watching by the sick, the laborer doomed to a 
life of toil and a struggle with poverty, all alike have 



TRAINING THE WILL. II7 

need of will-power of a high order. There is no 
place so high and no place so low as not to call it 
into requisition. Man's very position in the scale of 
being is determined by the presence or defect of this 
unconquerable energy, wisely directed to legitimate 
ends. 

How shall we secure the development of this regal 
power, this masterful spirit, this preeminently human 
element } 

First. We must make use of all means whatso- 
ever that tend to create, conserve, or economize the 
vital forces. Many children, both at home and at 
school, become feeble in body and weak in will from 
a neglect of observing the ordinary laws of health. 
Teachers are sometimes careless of the proper heat- 
ing, lighting, and ventilating of their schoolrooms, 
and thus become responsible for the undermining of 
the child's health and the destruction of his will- 
power. The abolition of the out-of-door recess with- 
out any proper substitute for it — thus depriving the 
pupils of a change of attitude, relief of mind, abund- 
ance of fresh air, contact with nature, exhilarating 
exercise, spontaneity of action — -is an innovation of 
doubtful propriety and fraught with possible evil 
consequences of no slight magnitude. 

Some form of physical exercise is essential to the 
child's well-being. Excursions into the woods, brisk 
walks, rambles by the brookside, climbing of hills, 
rowing, coasting, skating, if not excessive, are all 
admirable means of invigorating the system, stimu- 
lating the appetite, digestion, and food assimilation. 



I 18 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

Ordinary school life may be too confining for the 
young, and too repressive. It aims to secure disci- 
pline not by properly controlling and directing en- 
ergy, but by diminishing it. One might as well seek 
to control the movement of machinery not by 
regulating the throttle-valve, but by extinguishing 
the fire. What is needed in the schoolroom is not 
enforced quiet, but regulated energy. 

Much of the energy of children is wasted, not in 
play, but in wantonness, quarreling, purposeless exer- 
cises. The same force that the elephant uses in 
crushing his way through a thicket would enable him 
to bear upon his back many a useful burden along 
the highway. The force of the stream that once 
leaped and tumbled in wasteful wildness down the 
Falls of Saint Anthony, now guided in proper chan- 
nels turns the vast machinery at Minneapolis, con- 
verting wheat into flour and prairies into gardens. 
The vast expenditure made by European nations in 
armies worse than useless would, if wisely directed, 
add year by year enormously to the daily comfort 
and elevation of their people, and the rapid accumu- 
lation of all the products of an enlightened civiliza- 
tion. The secret of wealth is the economy of pro- 
duction^ — the wise direction of energy. It costs as 
much to construct a gun as a plow, to make a sword 
as a pruning-hook, to build a distillery as a mill. A 
saloon is more expensive than a meat market, and a 
standing army costs more than a system of universal 
education. 

So the native energy of the child that runs to waste, 



TRAINING THE WILL. I I9 

or that expands itself in mischief, cruelty, or wicked- 
ness, only needs to be turned into right channels 
to become fruitful of all high and noble results. 
Attention, punctuality, regularity, persistence, deci- 
sion, patience, endurance, fortitude, courage, are so 
many modes of will, so many channels of usefulness 
into which the exhaustless streams of child-life may 
be poured. The melting snows that rush in mad 
torrents down the mountain-side, or lose themselves 
in the turbid river or lifeless sea, when guided by the 
hand of man enrich the arid plains of Utah and 
make the wilderness to blossom as the rose. 

The child is stimulated to a healthful exercise of 
will by personal example, proper instruction, wise 
direction, kindly encouragement, suitable admonition, 
faithful warning, and just punishment. Will-power 
is not "strictly a fixed quantity dependent wholly 
upon physical conditions. It is a moral force and a 
variable quantity susceptible of very great increase. 
Thomas, standing like a rock at Chickamauga, in- 
spired all his army with heroic courage that success- 
fully resisted the fiercest assaults of the Confederate 
army. 

Second. Will culture involves a rightful care of 
the sensibilities — the forces that move the will. The 
will follows the lead of the heart. Men pursue with 
energy that which they love. Erasmus, impelled by 
a love of learning, Luther by enthusiasm for reform, 
Lincoln by an all-absorbing patriotism, put forth her- 
culean efforts in the prosecution of their lifework. 
History and the annals of private life as well are 



I20 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

replete with examples of sustained energy devoted 
to the attainment of worthy ends. Familiarity with 
these serves often to kindle in young minds aspira- 
tions that burst into flame and warm into action all 
the 'energies of the soul. The difference between 
Grant the unsuccessful business man and Grant the 
greatest general of his age was the difference be- 
tween a man drifting without a plan and a man con- 
centrating all the energies of his being and all the 
resources of a mighty nation for the accomplishment 
of a heroic purpose. 

Children are actuated by a great variety of mo- 
tives, and one of the chief functions of the teacher 
is to call into proper, healthful exercise the many 
motives of which they are susceptible. All the appe- 
tites, desires, affections, and emotions of the adult 
slumber in the bosom of childhood. Not all of them 
are appropriate to childhood ; none of them should be 
prematurely aroused. We are to avoid precocity as 
a disease. But we are more likely to err on the 
other side, and either allow the child's heart to lie 
fallow, or at most to call into activity only a few of 
the many motive-powers that are latent there. There 
are teachers that rule by the rod, and appeal almost 
wholly to fear ; others evoke shame, others vanity, 
and others emulation. This, if not a base develop- 
ment, is at least a one-sided one. Think of the 
many sentiments that can exist in the child's heart. 
Love of approbation, desire of society, love of knowl- 
edge, truthfulness, love of the beautiful, desire of 
success, consciousness of power, self-respect, sym- 



TRAINING THE WIIL. 12 1 

pathy, benevolence, generosity, filial and fraternal 
affection, patriotism, loyalty, fidelity, reverence, — all 
these and many more can be called into gentle exer- 
cise and forceful activity. Under their influence his 
whole being may be aroused, and his will be strongly 
and beneficently impelled. Many a boy has been 
changed from a mischief-maker and a truant into an 
obedient and industrious student by being taken into 
his teacher's confidence and made to feel that he was 
respected and trusted. Others have been reclaimed 
by being employed in some congenial, useful occupa- 
tion. Nothing can take the place of the careful 
study of the child's heart. 

Men have long and justly held in derision that 
system of agriculture at the South which sought 
year after year to extort from the soil but one kind 
of crop, ■ whether cotton or tobacco. The evil was 
surpassed only by the still more pitiable social system 
that subjected a race of human beings to the dom- 
ination of one sole motive, fear of the lash. What 
shall be said of a system of education which, assum- 
ing to develop the boundless possibilities of a human 
soul, calls into action the fewest possible number of 
its capacities of feeling and of its motive forces .-" 

Third. The moral being is one who out of all the 
variety of motives by which he may be actuated 
yields himself voluntarily only to the highest. The 
enlightened reason chooses between motives and 
gives the preference to the best. Ambition and jus- 
tice, desire of wealth and pity, love of approbation and 
truthfulness, love of family and patriotism, all alike, 



I 2 2 STUDIES IN FED A GOGY. 

each in its place and degree, are honorable. They 
may coincide or they may conflict, and the test of 
high character is the preference which is shown them 
in the decisive moment. The highest motive is a 
conscientious regard for truth and duty, " love for 
the right as God gives us to know the right." 

The goal of culture is freedom. In its ultimate 
analysis will is supreme. It is self-moved. Amid 
all the complexity of motive forces that act upon it, 
it yields itself of its own volition to the motive of its 
own choice. The will is regal, autocratic. Will cul- 
ture is the training that results from the habit of 
instinctive, ready choice of the highest aims, and of 
unswerving devotion to the accomplishment of its 
desire. Will culture is training in choices. 

Training the will to freedom can be done only in 
an atmosphere of freedom. The child must be early 
accustomed to self-reliance. He must make his own 
choices, and learn the sweetness and solemnity of 
liberty by self-directed activity. 

Special emphasis should be laid upon the sin of 
"breaking the will," so strongly and so justly con- 
demned by Kant. Corporal punishment, ridicule, 
sarcasm, humiliation, shame, or any infliction that 
degrades the child in his own esteem, is to be 
scrupulously avoided. 

On the other hand, infinite pains needs to be taken 
to awaken a keen sense of self-respect, a profound 
consciousness of the personal dignity that attaches 
to every human being, and exalted aspirations after 
noble pursuits, scholarly attainments, and excellent 



TRAINING THE WILL. 



123 



character. In our treatment of children psychologic 
optimism is better than pessimism. 

The vast energies at work in human society devel- 
oping our resources, molding our laws, shaping our 
industries, organizing and directing our social, polit- 
ical, and religious forces, should be under the abso- 
lute domination of conscience. The only safeguard 
that the republic can have against anarchy, riot, de- 
falcation, partisan strife, the clash of race and class, 
and ultimate ruin of peace, prosperity, and liberty 
itself is that kind of will culture that seeks to en- 
throne reason and conscience in the bosom of every 
pupil in the common schools. 



IX. 

TRAINING TO LEARN. 



Any piece of knowledge which the pupil has himself acquired, 
any problem which he has himself solved, becomes by virtue of the 
conquest much more thoroughly his than it could else be. 

Herbert Spencer. 

Inasmuch as the child is self-active, and grows only through the 
exercise of his self-activity, education consists entirely in leading 
the child to do what develops this power of doing. Any help that 
does not help the pupil to help himself is excessive. 

W. T. Harris, 

The idea which I have endeavored to give of the true relation of 
the pupil to the teacher, and which represents the former as carrying 
on his own self-tuition under the wise superintendence of the latter, 
is of course not new. Nothing strictly new can be said about educa- 
tion. The elements of it may easily be found in the principles and 
practice of Ascham, Montaigne, Ratich, Milton, Comenius, Locke, 
Rousseau, Pestalozzi, Jacotot, and Herbert Spencer. Those who are 
interested in the subject may find an account of the views and methods 
of these eminent men in Mr. Quick's valuable little book on Educa- 
tional Reformers. 

Joseph Payne. 



IX. 
TRAINING TO LEARN. 

The essential act in acquiring knowledge is the act of learning, and 
this is the pupil's act. — E. E. White. 

In the work of education — whereby the child 
becomes man, exchanging weakness for strength, 
ignorance for knowledge, awkwardness for skill, 
simplicity and inexperience for wisdom and con- 
firmed character — many factors conspire. The 
child grows spontaneously. Just as the acorn 
becomes the oak the babe becomes adult, passing 
through the various stages of infancy and youth to 
maturity by virtue of its inherent energies and man- 
ifest destiny. The parent may aid this process of 
growth and development by warding off evils and 
affording proper supplies of food, clothing, care, and 
guidance. Associates at home and abroad lend a 
hand in unconscious tutelage. Nature, with all its 
varied forces, performs no small share in bringing 
the youth to a knowledge of himself, his powers 
and limitations, privileges and obligations. Even 
the dullest must heed her warnings and remember 
her teachings. 

The chief agent in the great transformation, how- 
ever, must be the child himself. All education is, 
in its ultimate analysis, self-education. The energy 



128 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

which issues in growth or assimilates knowledge 
must originate in self and be self-directed. All the 
varied helps of home, school, and nature are but 
helps which the child must use. Like crutches, 
they are available only to him who has purpose 
and physical strength to handle them. The school, 
with all its appliances, libraries, laboratories, and 
teachers, is but an opportunity, valuable only in 
proportion as the pupil makes use of it. The 
teacher may do much for him by a wise and per- 
sistent scheme of training, so that each and all of 
the powers, physical, mental, moral, may be com- 
pletely, symmetrically, and harmoniously developed. 
But this can be done only by the pupil's consent 
and hearty cooperation. The teacher may impart 
instruction, not only giving him facts and truths, 
but seeing, as well, that he commits to memory large 
bodies of knowledge as set forth in books, and yet fall 
far short of securing the best results aimed at in the 
process of education. Instruction is good as far as 
it goes. 

Education is not only an individual, personal work, 
calling for the highest exercise of selfhood, but it 
is a lifelong process, requiring of the pupil that he 
shall be ever learning. His tasks are never done. 
Life's problems cease only with the grave, and the 
most diligent student finds the fleeting years all too 
short to enable him to exhaust any branch, however 
narrow, of human inquiry. 

The great function ,of the teacher's high office is 
to cause his pupil to learn. His finished work is not 



TRAINING TO LEARN. 1 29 

a walking encyclopaedia, nor an intellectual athlete, 
but a student, an earnest, humble learner. If he 
can so do his work that his pupil becomes a diligent 
seeker after truth, finding in the pursuit itself a sat- 
isfaction second only to that which comes from a 
conscious grasp of the eternal verities of nature, he 
has performed a good work. 

What then is meant by causing a pupil to learn } 
I use the expression in a somewhat unusual sense, 
perhaps, and should consequently explain precisely 
what I mean by it. By way of negative let it be 
said that it does not mean having him commit to 
memory stipulated tasks. A thing is not necessa- 
rily learned because it is committed to memory. 
A pupil may successfully memorize the lesson 
assigned him in a foreign language of which he 
does not understand a word. Some teachers would, 
and rightly too, have their students learn by heart 
portions of Cassar as the basis or beginning of their 
study of Latin. Montaigne was wont to declare that 
to "know a thing by heart is not to know it." With- 
out endorsing this extreme view, or even calling in 
question the very great importance of memorizing, 
it should be emphasized that merely memorizing is 
not all of learning, and is indeed a very small part of 
the whole process. Again, causing to learn does not 
mean what is often conveyed by the word instruct- 
ing. To instruct is to lead the pupil to understand 
what the teacher presents. The instructor assigns 
lessons, calls for recitations, questions, illustrates,^ 
explains, repeats, tests, and examines until he feels 



130 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

assured that the given subject has been understood 
by the pupil, and so in a certain sense mastered. 
This process is a higher, nobler one than that previ- 
ously described. But even this may come far short 
of the end to be desired, for the teacher takes the 
initiative, prepares the lesson, sets the task, conducts 
the tests, and thus supervises the work in all its 
extent. The pupil may remain largely passive. 
Like a sundial he points the time by a shadow on 
his face only so ^ong as the sun shines. Fenelon, 
with all his learnmg, eloquence, skill, and devotion, 
worked wonders for his royal pupil, but it must be 
said that his work was a splendid failure. What a 
youth needs is not a Mentor who, while guiding, 
stimulating, and instructing him, absorbs his will 
and overwhelms his personality. Education should 
conserve the individuality of the pupil. Perfected 
selfhood is the goal of culture. 

I. The first fundamental condition, then, upon 
which rests the work of causing to learn, is a 
supreme regard for the child's individuality. His 
personality should be regarded as sacred and invi- 
olable. Froebel was undoubtedly right in assigning 
so large a place to the child's dignity of person. 
He indeed saw in him — according to his pantheistic 
notions — a manifestation of divinity which led to 
the kindred error of supposing him to be prone 
only to good. Unfortunately this optimism is 
cruelly shaken in the practical contact with child- 
nature. Nevertheless, the conclusion drawn by 
Froebel that education is chiefly growth and must 



TRAINING TO LEARN. I3I 

be characterized by freedom and spontaneity is a 
great truth. 

No teacher ever succeeds who seeks to subdue the 
child's will, to curb unduly his natural propensities, 
to ignore his tastes, to violate his wishes, or to disre- 
gard his own peculiar endowments. No two children 
are alike in their capacities ; no two are fitted to fill 
precisely the same sphere in life. Each one, if left 
free, has his own point of view, and will have his 
own peculiar conception of the universe. This 
individuality is ordinarily recognized at home, and 
spontaneity is encouraged. Society is compelled to 
consider it, and every individual carves for himself 
his own career. It is chiefly in school that the pro- 
cess of restraint, suppression, domination, subduing 
is too much practised. The grim spectre authority 
has erected his awful throne in the schoolroom, and 
upon his dread altar multitudes of innocent victims 
are daily sacrificed. Fortunately for humanity the 
instinct of selfhood is too strong to be conquered, 
and children, some by escaping from school at an 
early age, some by open revolt, some by apparent 
submission and real rebellion, and some by force 
of necessity, in after years of free activity, either 
avoid, resist, or in part overcome the benumbing 
effects of the so-called discipline and training of the 
schools. 

Teachers should not tyrannize over their pupils, 
but should treat them with that respect which is 
due to free beings. We can make of the child a life- 
long learner only as we begin by calling into exercise, 



132 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

from his earliest infancy, that innate energy which 
expresses itself in its own way, chooses its own 
objects upon which to exert itself, and combines 
them after ways of its own. This can be done 
without pampering wilfulness, or developing self- 
hood into selfishness or offensive egoism. Liberty 
is not license, it is self-imposed law. The child 
must learn because he wills to learn. His knowl- 
edge should be chiefly that which he has wrested 
from nature by his own efforts. 

2. Closely akin to this reverence for the right of 
selfhood is another prerequisite to success in making 
of the child a learner, namely, the conservation and 
culture of curiosity. It is no more true that sparks 
fly upward and that water seeks its level than that 
children seek after knowledge. The mind was made 
for truth. Hunger is the divinely appointed prece- 
dent of food-taking, the one condition of nourish- 
ment. No hunger, no assimilation. Curiosity is to 
the mind what hunger is to the body. This divinely 
implanted force is the mainspring of action that 
impels all the mental forces and energizes all intel- 
lectual processes. What has the desire of knowledge 
not wrought .'' It has impelled the navigator through 
unknown seas, allured the explorer through untrod- 
den continents, across dreary deserts, over pathless 
mountains and through trackless forests. It has 
stimulated invention, reared observatories, collected 
museums, founded colleges, established libraries, and 
has laid under contribution the heavens above us, the 
earth about us, and the depths of the ocean. Man is 



TRAINING TO LEARN. 1 33 

never satisfied so long as tliere remain any secrets of 
mind or matter, liistory, science, or religion which he 
has not explored. 

To know is his birthright, to learn is his preroga- 
tive. What is true of the race is measurably true of 
each individual of the race. It is not only his duty 
and his right to know, but it is his privilege and 
pleasure as well. To know belongs to man by virtue 
of his manhood. The desire to know is among the 
earliest manifestations of conscious life. The open 
eye, the outstretched hand of the infant is soon fol- 
lowed by the listening ear and the inquiring tongue 
of the child. To guard this impulse from injury, to 
gratify without dulling it, to stimulate without over- 
burdening it, to direct without attempting to tyran- 
nize over it, to keep it ever eager, vigilant, healthy 
is a great part of the teacher's work. 

The child's curiosity will of necessity be directed 
largely by its innate tendencies. One child is curi- 
ous after causes, another after means ; one delights 
in birds, another in flowers ; one loves nature, 
another books ; one revels in stories of adventure, 
another busies himself with the laws of perspective 
and the fascinating mysteries of color, while yet 
another finds pleasure in mathematical problems and 
the laws that underlie them. 

It may be asserted with great confidence that 
eagerness to know, springing from the child's inner- 
most nature, is absolutely essential to constitute him 
in any true sense a learner ; that this is planted by 
the Creator's hand in germ in every child's nature ; 



134 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

that it grows by what it feeds on, and that the 
teacher may and should supply those conditions by 
which this great gift should be kept in healthful 
activity. 

3. This leads to a third important principle, 
namely, that to foster the spirit of learning in the 
pupil learning must be made pleasurable. Quin- 
tilian said, "Let study be to the child a play." 
Fenelon went to the extreme of making of the 
school a bazaar and of study a pastime. He would 
have nothing hard or disagreeable in education. 
"There all metals are gold, all flowers are roses." 
John Locke, while recommending a hardening pro- 
cess for the boy to prepare him for bearing life's 
burdens, would still make study attractive and 
throw around it whatever of delight is consistent 
with earnest labor. 

It is doubtless true that education necessarily 
involves something of restraint, limitation, control, 
and labor, which is irksome to the average pupil. 
Perhaps there maybe "no royal road to learning." 
There is an admitted necessity for discipline and 
direction on the part of the teacher. Education 
consists in part in learning obedience, in acquiring 
the habits of doing even disagreeable work from a 
sense of duty. Nevertheless, it is to be emphasized 
that the school should not be a prison within whose 
walls unwilling children are to be confined by force 
and driven to unwelcome tasks by frowns and threats 
and blows. The very atmosphere of many school- 
rooms is heavy and depressing With nothing to 



TRAINING TO LEARN 1 35 

relieve the bleakness of the surroundings, the bare- 
ness of the walls, the hardness of the benches, 
the monotony of the recitations, the dreariness of 
the tasks, and the severity of the discipline, the 
school becomes to many a child a dreadful place 
from which even a factory affords a welcome release. 

Whatever may be done to render the schoolhouse 
comfortable and tasteful, the discipline kind, and the 
methods of instruction attractive should be done in 
order that the associations of school life shall always 
be pleasant, and that the pupil may be led by the 
sweet allurements of the place to put forth his best 
efforts in the pursuit of knowledge. 

The games, occupations, music, birds, and flowers 
of the kindergarten ; the stories, the " Friday after- 
noons," the singing, and gymnastics of the primary 
and intermediate grades ; the cabinets of illustra- 
tions, and excursions of the grammar schools ; the 
workshops, laboratories, and growing consciousness 
of power and increasing appreciation of the value 
of knowledge characteristic of the high school; and 
the widening range of vision, profounder insight into 
truth, the greater freedom of choice and independ- 
ence of labor, together with the genial companion- 
ship and stimulating example of great scholars to be 
found in the universities, should make of every stage 
of school life a delightful feast, and awaken in the 
mind of the student a burning zeal for knowledge. 
If this result fails the fault will often be found in 
the feebleness of the teacher or the faultiness of his 
methods. 



136 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

4. Rising to a still higher plane in this ascending 
series we reach a fourth condition of success in 
developing in the pupil an abiding love of learning. 
All learning must be in its earlier stages intuitive; 
the child must be brought face to face with things. 
There is no possible way, from the very nature of 
the human constitution, whereby a child can have 
definite ideas of color except by sight ; of odors 
except by smell. Each sense must be the medium 
through which the soul is brought into direct rela- 
tion with those qualities of matter to which it and it 
alone is adjusted. If the pupil is to know the quali- 
ties of things he must be brought into vital contact 
with them. It is not true that one can have no 
knowledge except that which is intuitive, but it is 
true that the basis of all knowledge of material 
things is sense perception. The fundamental data 
of knowledge, what Pestalozzi calls " mother ideas," 
are those primal notions of things that come to us 
through the senses. The child must be put into 
right relationship with nature, and his knowledge of 
distance, direction, plants, animals, minerals, indus- 
tries, commerce, political economy, and history must 
rest upon personal observation. Physiology cannot 
be successfully taught without the skeleton, nor 
physics and chemistry outside of the laboratory. 

The mind brought into proper relation to nature, to 
things, to objects of sense, is allured to activity, grat- 
ified, fed, developed, educated. Learning becomes 
a perennial and exhaustless source of joy. But an 
attempt to teach science from books, before the 



TRAINING TO LEARN. 1 37 

preliminary ideas have been made familiar by obser- 
vation, is not only futile, but destructive of the pow- 
ers of the mind. Many a child is ruined for life by 
the deadening process of cramming his memory with 
words of whose meaning he is ignorant. Words are 
but symbols, and are chiefly valuable as reviving the 
memory of past experiences, or of putting into con- 
venient and orderly shape the processes of our own 
thinking, or at best of stimulating the mind to put 
itself by its own energies into the same state as 
that occupied by the writer. As a general law words 
should come after ideas ; the child should learn 
things before he learns about things ; he should 
derive all his ideas of number by counting, com- 
bining, separating, dividing, weighing, and measuring 
things ; .he should not be taught to read until he has 
ideas and thoughts, and can embody them in sen- 
tences of his own structure. Books should sup- 
plement and not precede oral instruction. Facts 
should precede principles ; processes come before 
rules. Grammar and rhetoric should always follow 
practical language ; literature should comprise the 
reading of the authors and not merely reading 
about them ; foreign language should be learned by 
use and not from grammar. Geography should as 
far as possible be learned from travel, and psychol- 
ogy from introspection. 

This great law of nature, the imperative necessity 
of knowledge at first hand, has been repeated by all 
the great reformers in educational methods, by Mon- 
taigne, Rousseau, Locke, Comenius, Pestalozzi, and 



138 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

Froebel, and is so patent as to command at once the 
assent of every thoughtful mind, and yet it is ruth- 
lessly violated every day nearly everywhere and, I 
might almost say, by nearly everybody. And Nature 
avenges herself by blinding the teachers who do it 
and by stupefying the minds of their victims. The 
school, which should be a seminary, a place of seed- 
sowing, becomes a charnel-house, the burial-place of 
fond hopes and youthful aspirations. 

The meagre results that often issue from long 
years of schooling, the vast number of pupils that 
drop out of the lower grades, the few that find their 
way to college, the spirit of indifference to learning 
that pervades so many educational institutions, the 
oft-repeated criticism of the public school system for 
its lack of practical results, the widespread agitation 
in favor of industrial training, and the bitter com- 
plaint of many distinguished men as to how they 
were educated, all point to a real defect in our 
system of instruction. It is the part of wisdom to 
locate the evil, if possible, and then to remove it. 

None perhaps will be bold enough to deny that 
the evil consists, in part, at least, in the too preva- 
lent habit of substituting words for things, books for 
nature, and that the remedy for this form of the 
evil is to be found in relegating the textbook to its 
proper place, in emancipating the pupil from bondage 
to the letter, and in restoring to him the freedom of 
intercourse with nature, either directly or by means 
of cabinets and laboratories. 

5. Another cardinal principle of education, spring- 



TRAINING TO LEARN. 1 39 

ing from the very constitution of the human mind, is 
that the fullest activity of all the child's powers must 
be called into requisition in the process of learning. 
The sources of human knowledge are few. The 
primal source of knowledge of the world without 
is observation, of the world within is conscious- 
ness. When we add to these reflection, testimony, 
and authority we have exhausted the category. Each 
of these should be duly recognized. Neither can 
be a substitute for the other. The child should be 
habituated to avail himself of each and all of them. 
It is not enough that he be brought into contact 
with nature. The North American savage and the 
African bushman have always lived in contact with 
nature, and are savage still. Men grow up in the 
country, with no knowledge of botany, and in the 
city and remain ignorant of society. The work of 
the teacher is to stimulate the pupil to use his 
senses. But the senses may easily be overstimulated, 
and the man become thereby brutalized. The cat 
has a sharp eye and the dog a keen smell without 
becoming intellectual. There is imperative need 
that the child shall be led to think and be exercised 
in forming judgments. Agassiz is said to have 
declared that "the chief thing in education is the 
habit of comparison," while Montaigne laid great 
stress upon forming the judgment. The Jesuits were 
intent upon training the memory, while Locke asserted 
that it was incapable of being trained. Setting aside 
these partial views we may state, what would now 
be generally accepted, that in the acquisition of 



140 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

learning all our faculties are to be engaged. The 
senses give us material qualities ; consciousness, 
mental states ; reflection brings to light relations, 
causes, forces ; memory brings back the past, and 
imagination presents the distant and the unseen. 
Testimony weighed, sifted, digested is our reliance 
for knowledge out of the range of personal experi- 
ence, and authority supplies what lies beyond the 
reach of both our experience and our reason. 

6. To cause a child to learn consists largely in 
directing him to the right sources of knowledge, 
showing him how to avail himself of them, and 
plying him with such motives that he will make 
right use of them. 

Books have their value as testimony to matters of 
fact and as authority on questions of doctrine, and 
every child who is to be a learner must know how to 
use them. They are now the chief source of knowl- 
edge to every student. No man can safely ignore 
them. They bring within the reach of the individual 
the results of the labors of the race, and make avail- 
able in a brief space of time the scholarly toil of 
past ages. When the learner enters a library he 
becomes a citizen of the world, a companion of the 
great, and is restricted in his companionship with 
the wise by no limits of time, space, nationality, 
creed, or caste. Books are priceless treasures. 
They are to the scholar among the necessaries of 
life, like food, fire, and raiment. But books are 
helpful only to him who knows how to use them. 
They are not made to be devoured either by the 



TRAINING TO LEARN. \\\ 

stomach or the memory. Nor are they a substitute 
for thinking, but only an aid. They should not pre- 
cede, but should supplement, personal effort. They 
are helpful when rightly used, but deadly hurtful 
when abused. Idolatry is misdirected worship; mere 
memorizing of textbooks is a sort of intellectual 
fetichism. To be taught to observe, to reflect, to 
think, to read, to reason is to be put on the great 
highroad to learning. 

This law of activity which requires that the stu- 
dent through his entire course of study should be 
called upon to put forth his own energies admits 
wide and varied application. It underlies the occu- 
pations of the kindergarten. It explains the true 
meaning and intent of object-teaching, whereby the 
child is led to study the object for itself and report 
the results of its observations. It is the secret of 
language lessons, in which he is required first to 
think and then to give expression to his thought in 
his own way. In form and drawing he is led to 
inventive efforts ; in geography, to map drawing 
and modeling in clay ; in number, to constructing 
his own tables and framing his own problems. In 
geometry the pupil works out original demonstra- 
tions, and in the study of the natural sciences he 
seeks by experiment and induction to discover for 
himself laws and classifications. It is urged by the 
ablest advocates of industrial training that its chief 
advantage is that it stimulates the mind to greater 
and more varied activity and supplements mental by 
muscular action ; that the pupil becomes a creator, 



142 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

and learns by doing. One great privilege in a nor- 
mal school is the opportunity of teaching while 
studying, for teaching is a capital way of learning. 
Recitations, reproductions, written examinations, 
composition, original investigation, all rest upon 
the recognized principle that one condition of learn- 
ing is the calling of the student's powers into activ- 
ity. What is urged here is the more complete 
recognition of this law in all school work, in the 
learning of Latin, Greek, and history as well as in 
the physical sciences. 

It was a favorite theory of that able writer, 
Jacotot, so much eulogized by Joseph Payne, that 
a teacher may teach what he himself does not know 
and that a pupil may learn everything from a very 
few things. " Tout est dans toiit^' he insisted. His 
method of proceeding went far toward justifying 
what at first appears paradoxical, if not absurd. 
The teacher does not teach, he incites his pupil to 
learn. Supplying him with a suitable object for 
study, he proceeds to question him as to what he 
observes and what he thinks. Under the teacher's 
guidance and stimulus he becomes deeply interested 
in the pursuit, brings to bear upon it all his ener- 
gies, and achieves marvelous results. Although his 
method was wholly different, Socrates, the greatest 
teacher of antiquity, proceeded upon the same prin- 
ciple — that his business was not to teach, but to set 
his pupils to learning. This he did by a very 
effective method of questioning, which led them to 
the most intense mental activity and independent 
research. 



TRAINING TO LEARN. 1 43 

In conclusion, let me cite the example and method 
of the Great Teacher, whose influence in inciting 
men to become devotees of sacred learning has been 
so widespread and intense for wellnigh two thousand 
years. Though divine in his personality, he yet 
respected the individuality of every man, lived on 
familiar terms of intimacy even with the lowly and 
ignorant. While making revelations to men of the 
hidden mysteries of God's kingdom, he concealed far 
more than he revealed, and while feeding their curi- 
osity, he fed it only to intensify its hunger. He 
threw about his teaching the charm of parable, 
simile, and story, and illustrated his doctrines by 
deeds that appealed to the senses. He led his 
disciples to the seaside and the mountain-top, and 
by his words threw a halo around not Palestine only, 
but over all nature as well. He incited his pupils to 
activity by telling them that only those willing to do 
his will and keep his commandments could know his 
doctrine. We may not slavishly copy his example, 
but if we would succeed in arousing in our pupils an 
abiding devotion to learning, we may with profit 
study his methods and strive to catch something of 
his spirit. 



X. 
TRAINING IN MUSIC. 



Music is the universal language of mankind. 

H. W. Longfellow. 



Singing is as natural to man as speaking, and for any reason that 
appears to the contrary, it should be as universal. 



James Currie. 



Music religious heat inspires. 

It wakes the soul and lifts it high, 
And wings it with sublime desires, 

And fits it to bespeak the Deity. 



Addison. 



We attach such supreme importance to a musical education 

because rhythm and harmony sink most deeply into the recesses of the 

soul, bringing gracefulness in their train, and making a man graceful 

if he is rightly nurtured. 

Plato. 



X. 

TRAINING IN MUSIC. 

Unless a schoolmaster know how to sing, I think him of no account. 

— Luther. 

We are slowly outgrowing the notion that the 
common schools should confine their instructions 
to the "three R's." Preparation for the duties 
of citizenship is not completed when a child can 
read a ballot, write his name, and count the price 
of his vote. Gradually the <:urriculum of even the 
commonest school is enlarging so as to include 
physiology, history, morals, and civics. 

Vocal music should be taught scientifically in 
every public school, as a regular study, and special 
attention should be paid to it in all the lower grades, 
particularly the primary and the kindergarten. 

One of the obvious reasons for this is that music 
lends a charm to the school and renders it attractive. 
The kindergarten games with musical accompaniment 
are fascinating for little children, and in the primary 
grades no time passes more delightfully than that 
spent in singing. With proper training, the love for 
music grows with the growth of the pupil. Even in 
academy, high school, normal school, and college, 
music hath still its charms, and the recollection of 
hymns and the echo of songs linger long in the 



148 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

memory of graduates and recall some of the sweet- 
est experiences of schooldays. There are very few 
children indeed that are not susceptible to its influ- 
ences, and even those who do not sing themselves 
delight in hearing others. School is not attractive 
to all. Many find its restraints irksome, its routine 
monotonous, its discipline hard to bear. Whatever 
can be done to awaken in such pupils a love for 
school should be done. To some of them certainly 
music may be winsome. 

It is an aid in school government. It softens the 
childish asperities, sweetens the temper, and predis- 
poses to obedience. Harmony is the soul of music 
and where this reigns discord vanishes. Especially 
is it true that teachers who love song are less likely 
to be snappish and to stir up antagonisms than those 
who do not. Singing at the opening of school brings 
at once all hearts into unison and is an admirable 
preparation for the work of the day. Those who 
have come to school bent on mischief are disarmed. 
When school closes with a song in which all join, 
the tired mind finds rest, the overtaxed nerves are 
relieved, the little annoyances of the day are forgot- 
ten, wounded feelings are healed, and the children go 
to their homes, not to find fault with the school, but 
to praise it, and, instead of plotting mischief for the 
morrow, they plan pleasant things. 

Music is helpful as a means of physical training, 
for it promotes deep breathing, erect posture, and 
encourages a proper regard for the throat and lungs 
as the instruments of sound. By cultivating the 



TRAINING IN MUSIC. 149 

voice it becomes specially valuable as an auxiliary 
to pleasing conversation, good reading, and elegant 
speaking. It is an invaluable means for securing 
mental development, the chief end for which schools 
are established. Rightly taught it develops atten- 
tion, observation, especially trains the sense of hear- 
ing, cultivates the memory, the imagination, and the 
judgment. It secures precision, promptness, and 
develops good taste. It promotes cheerfulness, 
fortitude, goodfellowship, and an appreciation of 
the mutual dependence of all who live together in 
a community. It is a preparation for good citizen- 
ship. 

It is a thought worthy of especial consideration 
that the effects of music learned at school are felt 
at once in the home circle. The busy mother and 
the tired father may not care to hear the child recite 
the multiplication table, analyze a sentence, describe 
the climate of China, or read a selection from the 
Fourth Reader, but they will be pleased to listen as 
he sings while at work or play, and often that song 
is the very breath of heaven to drive from heart and 
home the clouds of care and sorrow. The mass of 
school-children come from the homes of the poor, 
where life is serious and where there is not much to 
cheer. A merry child, singing the: songs of the 
school, is an angel of beauty in such a household. 
Often children of the same family or the same 
neighborhood form a choir whose music is one of 
the greatest charms of the circle. Life is bitter 
enough at best, and even under the most favorable 



150 ST UDIES IN FED A GOGY. 

circumstances the weight of care is hard to endure. 
We need the help of music to gladden the heart, 
cheer the hope, and drown our sorrows. In what 
other way can its sweet influence be so widely 
diffused as by its introduction into all our schools 
whence it permeates the humblest cottage as well as 
the more favored home .'' 

A very large proportion of our population have an 
interest in some form of religious worship where 
music is employed. Musical instruction in school 
enables the children to share in this delightful ser- 
vice and thus becomes in the highest degree tributary 
to their well-being. Those who insist so strongly 
that the schools should be practical and prepare 
their pupils for their various spheres in life must 
concede that the ability to sing is a preparation for 
home life, a passport in society, an indispensable 
prerequisite to participation in church service, and a 
sweet solace to many even in solitude. 

Every one who has ever been in Germany knows 
how large a part music plays in the pleasures of the 
people. Their musical festivals are attended by 
thousands who find in them their highest delight. 
The over-driven people of America need the recre- 
ation, the amusement, the happiness, which would 
flow immediately out of universal instruction in 
music in our public schools. 

Unlike many of the popular amusements, music 
leaves no sting behind : its tendency is to refine and 
ennoble. Certainly it is incomparably better for the 
people to love music than to love prize-fighting, bull- 



TRAINING IN MUSIC. \ 5 I 

baiting, horse-racing, or even boat-racing or ball- 
playing. It is suitable for men, women, and children ; 
it is within the reach of all ; promotes sociability, 
improves the manners, and offers little inducement 
for excess or immorality. 

An incidental advantage growing out of our 
public school system is the equalization of life's 
blessings. Wealth and all its attendant advantages 
tends towards aggregation. The rich grow richer 
and the poor poorer. Classes grow apart, social 
distinctions incline towards fixedness. Caste springs 
up. The poor grow disheartened, and social antago- 
nisms, jealousies, hatreds, spring up that threaten 
the peace and prosperity of all. The public school 
tends to prevent all this by putting the rudiments 
of education, which are the elements of power, into 
the hands of the poorest. The rich, by the pittance 
of school-tax, maintain a system of education that 
calls into exercise all the latent powers that slumber 
in the minds of the children of poverty, awakens 
ambition, gives an appreciation of beauty, develops 
a consciousness of power, a sense of dignity, and 
starts them in life's struggle with something like 
an even chance. The public school levels up. 
Cultivation in music plays a large part in this 
leveling-up process. It is in its nature aesthetic, 
it reaches the taste, cultivates a love for beauty in 
all its forms, and opens to the child some of the 
rarest pleasures which otherwise might be the sole 
prerogative of the rich. 

Another great function of the American public 



152 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

school is to awaken in the hearts of our youth a 
sympathy for each other. The most obvious feature 
of our population is its mixed character. We have 
all nationalities represented, and in many parts of 
the country the native and the foreign elements are 
about equally divided. We have Germans and 
French, English and Irish, Russians and Poles, 
Italians and Scandinavians, Negroes and Chinamen. 
The elements of racial war are here in great abund- 
ance. Our peace and prosperity as a nation depend 
largely upon the complete harmonization of these 
clashing elements. This is our great task — the 
one great problem of the age. To break down 
race distinctions, destroy race prejudices, annihilate 
inherited hatreds, and bring all these peoples under 
the sway of common ideas and sentiments, is an 
undertaking that may well stagger the stoutest heart. 
But it must be done. Out of this manifoldness we 
must be one people. E pliiribics uniivi is our watch- 
word. 

There is but one agency that is competent for this 
mighty task : that is the American public school, 
where all are on a level, where rich and poor, high 
and low, native and foreign, white and black, the 
Christian and the "heathen Chinee " meet together, 
and the common school is the friend of them all. 
The first bond of union is a common language. The 
English children who speak with vernacular fluency 
the same tongue are no longer aliens to each other. 
All other differences are slight compared with a 
difference of speech. When this is gone intercourse 



TRAINING IN MUSIC. I 53 

is made easy, misunderstandings disappear, reconcili- 
ations are easy, and children readily fraternize, 
and, in many cases, as readily intermarry. Race 
peculiarities are not troublesome when under the 
same roof, and German and French blood flow 
quietly together in the same veins. 

The influence of song in breaking down discordant 
differences is scarcely less than that of language 
itself. I stood recently in the great school at 
Carlisle, Pennsylvania, where four hundred Indian 
boys and girls, representing forty different tribes, 
with generations of bloody antipathies, were singing, 
and as the volume of song rose in its majestic and 
harmonious swell, all hearts seemed united. When 
I saw a little later out on the campus, Sioux, 
Pawnees, and Apaches, parading arm in arm, 
seemingly unconscious of any tribal distinctions, 
it seemed a prophecy of the good time coming, 
when under the influence of the public schools the 
children of this land will know no difference of 
ancestry, but will all be Americans, Music is not 
the only nor the chief agency in this tremendous 
transformation, but it is one of the greatest, one of 
the most effective, and one of the most indispensable 
factors. To neglect it is the height of folly, to use 
it the highest wisdom. 

Another reason for teaching music in the public 
schools is that it is a part of a complete education. 
Education is the unfolding and disciplining of all our 
powers. The capacity for music is just as much a 
part of our common human nature as the ability to 



154 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

think. The appreciation of sounds is second in 
importance only to the appreciation of form and 
color. To neglect the ear while we train the eye is 
to discriminate unfairly against one of the chief 
senses. To educate a child and not train him in 
music is to give him a one-sided culture, a truncated 
development. He is not a complete man, he is 
defective. Incapable of appreciating the marvelous 
and exhaustless beauties of sound, unable to express 
his feelings in the most expressive way, shut out 
from sympathetic companionship of those more 
fortunate than himself, he has been robbed of his 
birthright. 

The State has practically monopolized the business 
of education. The great mass of children receive 
no other training than that received in the public 
school. When they quit the public school, they quit 
systematic study. Their education in its truest sense 
is ended. If they receive no musical training in 
school, they never receive it. If the State does not 
provide for the culture of this important part of 
their nature, it will remain dormant. When grown 
to manhood and womanhood they will have a right 
to say to the State : — 

"We are grateful to you for your care of us in 
childhood, for the provisions you made for our 
education, but we feel that your work was not 
complete. You taught us to read, but not to sing; 
to express our thoughts in words, but not in song ; to 
appreciate the beauties of color, but not of sound. 
You opened the way for an appreciation of the 



TRAINING IN MUSIC. I 55 

world's great poets, but not of the world's great 
composers." I do not see how the State can reply 
to this criticism. It has assumed to educate, it takes 
under its care millions of little children, and keeps 
them at school from five to fourteen, the most impres- 
sive period of life, and says to parents : " Ample 
provision has been made for the education of your 
children ; costly schoolhouses, competent teachers, 
and extensive superintendence has rendered private 
work unnecessary." The State educates. This puts 
the State under the most solemn obligations to do all 
that is implied in the word education. At least if 
the State undertakes the education of the child 
during its early years, it owes to the child to do 
all that ought to be done during those years. 

If music is ever to be taught it must be taught in 
childhood. It should begin in the nursery, be fos- 
tered by the mother, and encouraged in the home 
circle. But the time and place for systematic musical 
training is the school in childhood. It should find 
a place in the regular school curriculum and form a 
part of the daily exercises. It should be a study, 
a continuous, prolonged course, beginning with the 
simplest rudiments and leading the child on by suc- 
cessive steps, systematic drill, and much practice, 
until he can render difficult pieces, appreciate the 
highest classics, and himself know something of 
composition. 

But the question whether the State shall teach 
music is much broader than it seems. It is really 
the question whether popular education shall be 



156 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

restricted to the merely practical, the useful, the 
"bread and butter" studies, or whether it shall 
include those studies that refine and liberalize. 
Shall we teach only facts, or shall we also teach 
the beautiful ? Is man only a beast of burden, 
or is he a social being and capable of the highest 
and noblest enjoyments ? On every side is heard a 
clamor for industrial education, manual training, the 
teaching of trades. Some would convert the school 
into a laundry, a carpenter-shop, or a smithy; pupils 
into apprentices, and teachers into master-mechanics. 
While conceding the force of many of their argu- 
ments and a modicum of truth in some of the claims, 
it should be strongly insisted upon that the prime 
aim of schools is training of faculty, development of 
character, culture. A child trained to think, to feel, 
to enjoy, will find ways of getting a living and for 
gratifying his tastes. 

Life does not consist in the abundance of things 
one possesses but in the ability to enjoy what one 
has. A large place in even the primary schools can 
be vindicated for vocal music, as a culture study, an 
instrument of refinement and of enrichment of the 
soul. 



XI. 
TRAINING TO USE BOOKS. 



The true university in these days is a collection of books. 

Thomas Carlyle. 



Books are the best things well used; abused, among the worst. 

R. W. Emerson. 



Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some 

few to be chewed and digested. 

Francis Bacon. 



If I were to pray for a taste that should stand me in stead under 
any variety of circumstances, and be a source of happiness and 
cheerfulness to me through life, and a shield against its ills, however 
things might go amiss and the world frown upon me, it would be 
a taste for reading. 

Sir John Herschel. 



XL 
TRAINING TO USE BOOKS. 

I am inclined to think the most useful help to reading is to know 
what we should not read. — Frederick Harrison. 

According to the last published report (1884-85) 
of the Commissioner of Education, there are in the 
United States more than five thousand public 
libraries, with more than twenty million volumes. 
It is, therefore, a very pertinent question, What 
should be the relationship between the public 
libraries and the public schools .'' It is the purpose 
of this paper to outline an answer to this inquiry. 

The public library would be comparatively useless 
without the public school. Men must know how to 
read before they need books. Indeed a very high 
order of intelligence is required before they are able 
to profit to any great degree by their use. There 
are good books and bad books, books full of truth 
and books not so full, books that energize and books 
that enervate, books on which men feed and grow 
wise, strong, and good, and books that render the 
reader weak, foolish, and vicious^ Even the books 
that have come down to us from antiquity, sifted and 
tested by time, and stamped by common consent as 
classic, differ widely in merit, while a very large 
proportion of modern books have little or no perma- 
nent value. A library is, or at least may be, simply 



l6o STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

a Storehouse in which is gathered a miscellaneous 
collection of books, good, bad, and indifferent, 
ancient and modern, on subjects scientific, literary, 
and historical. To an ignorant man such a library is 
without significance or value. True the veriest boor 
may learn something by a visit to a botanical garden, 
a museum of curiosities, or a menagerie, but he will 
scarcely have even his wonder excited by a visit to a 
public library, unless it be at the folly of those who 
find any interest therein. Public libraries are for 
the educated : they follow and supplement the public 
schools. 

If a library is to be really useful to a community, 
it is necessary that its readers should be specially 
trained for using it. They need to know not only 
what books are worth reading, but also how to read 
them. A large portion of the habitual patrons of 
the public library have a very low standard of choice 
in selecting their reading. They are about as com- 
petent to select their books as sick people are to 
choose their medicines or children their food. When 
students have learned to read, and have had their 
thirst for books awakened, they are just as likely to 
read bad books as good ones. The fevered man 
drinks ice-water to his detriment and the hungry boy 
gorges himself with green fruit to his sorrow. So 
too the curious child eagerly devours sensational 
trash, goody-goody nonsense, or poisonous literature, 
destructive alike of purity and strength. A part of 
the teacher's work is to guard him from the miasma 
of pernicious literature by fostering a taste for that 
which is wholesome. 



TRAINING TO USE BOOKS. l6l 

The teacher can suggest to pupils valuable books 
suitable for their age, attainments, tastes, and neces- 
sities. Many a boy has been ruined by the dime 
novel, who might have been saved by reading boo'Ks 
of real adventure and true heroism, suggested to him 
by some thoughtful, faithful teacher. Seldom does 
a day pass when the vigilant teacher has not an 
opportunity, either in class or in private conversa- 
tion, to drop into the prepared soil of some pupil's 
mind a hint of some valuable book to read. When 
a reading class has become interested in a beautiful 
selection from some classic author, how natural for 
the teacher to say, "To-morrow I will bring from the 
library a volume of this author's works, and read to 
you another choice selection ; some of you may wish 
to read the entire volume." Each reading lesson 
may thus unlock some fascinating alcove of the 
public library, and the lifelong habit of reading good 
books be inaugurated. 

Pupils of the public schools need to be shown how 
to consult a public library. Many who enter the not 
always too attractive rooms, where long rows of 
books peep at them from behind barred doors, or 
grin at them from inaccessible shelves, or stand like 
well-drilled soldiers in solemn ranks, disguised with 
their paper uniforms, defying recognition, are 
bewildered and turn away empty. They need to be 
introduced to the library, to be shown its various 
departments and subdivisions, its catalogues, 
indexes, and bulletins, and the method of using them. 
They need to be instructed in the art of consulting 



J 62 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

the books themselves ; to have explained to them 
the significance of the table of contents and of the 
index, if the book is so fortunate as to have one, and 
the value of reference, cross-reference, and footnote. 
They should be taught the art of sampling, skipping, 
extracting, and comparing, and be thus inducted into 
the science of transferring to their minds from the 
printed page the " words that breathe and thoughts 
that burn," and of converting them into mental 
furnishing, spiritual essence, and practical fibre. 

Men who know how to read a book with discrimi- 
nating intelligence, appreciating and appropriating 
its best things, discovering and discarding its errors, 
are rare. To read well is to think well. Few think 
well who have not been especially trained to think. 
One of the privileges of the teacher is to read to his 
students, to hear them read, not as a reading 
exercise, but as a process of training them to the 
profitable use of books. 

Every school needs to have its own books of refer- 
ence and supplementary reading, a miniature library 
which should be in daily use by the pupils, freely 
accessible to all under the constant supervision and 
■direction of the teacher. On his desk should always 
be found books germane to the subject he is teach- 
ing : a mathematical dictionary for the arithmetic 
class, books of travel for geography, standard works 
in history and science to which students should be 
constantly referred for detailed statements of facts, 
extended illustrations, and full discussions such as 
are not practicable in a classroom nor appropriate 
for a textbook. 



TRAINING TO USE BOOKS. 1 63 

A part of the time of many recitations may be 
profitably spent in hearing informal reports from the 
students, on what they have read in books designated 
by the teacher, on topics assigned for investigation, 
or as to what they have found of interest in their 
miscellaneous reading. 

Topical recitations, preparation for which has been 
made by the pupils by the examination of books 
taken from the public library, are especially for 
advanced classes particularly valuable. 

In Providence, Worcester, and other cities, sets of 
books can be taken from the public library for school 
use. Students who have learned to use these library 
books as well as the dictionaries, cyclopaedias, and 
books of reference belonging to the school, and who 
are accustomed to weekly visits to the public library, 
undef the escort of a teacher, soon acquire intelligent 
skill in availing themselves of the help of books, and 
gain a method of reading and investigation that will 
insure lifelong progress in the work of self-culture. 

If the public library is largely dependent on the 
public school for its usefulness to the community, so, 
on the other hand, is the school largely dependent 
for the performance of its full mission upon the work 
of the public library. The large body of the world's 
knowledge and wisdom is shut up in books. A 
library is a vast treasure-house of information. Into 
it are gathered the results of ages of observation and 
thought. Whoever would be truly wise must be a 
reader of books. One of the chief functions of a 
schoolmaster is to foster a thirst for learning- and to 



164 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

initiate his students into the proper use of a library. 
Without this his work as a teacher is only partially 
done. 

Very much of the work done in the schoolroom 
has a tendency to disgust pupils with books by 
setting before them the mastery of the text as the 
chief business of life ; thus study becomes a drudgery, 
a task, a burden, which at the earliest opportunity is 
abandoned. Study should be made interesting and 
school work a delight by bringing it into such rela- 
tions with comprehensive reading as to show that all 
school exercises facilitate the intelligent use of books. 
The public library with its treasures should stand as 
a goal toward which each courser in the school race 
is bending. 

Especially does the library lend its generous aid 
in preventing narrowness of view, pettiness of 
attainment, bigotry of opinion, and the insufferable 
conceit which are the possible growths of the hotbed 
of the schoolroom. The untrained reader may have 
breadth without depth, the unread student may have 
intensity without either depth or breadth. Neither 
has symmetry. Thorough training in the school, 
supplemented by a wise and generous use of the 
public library, tends to give depth, breadth, and 
catholicity. The school trains, the library enriches. 

The public library may be especially helpful to the 
school by the invaluable aid it can render to advanced 
students in the preparation of essays. The librarian, 
by furnishing them copious references, puts them in 
the way of ascertaining the best things that have 



TRAINING TO USE BOOKS. 165 

already been said on the topics they propose to 
discuss. 

In every public library there should be a depart- 
ment devoted to pedagogical literature. In no period 
of our history has there been such a demand among 
teachers and school officers for this class of books. 
It is one of the most encouraging signs of the times ; 
and to foster the movement, deepening and directing 
it, is an urgent duty of the hour. In what better 
way can this be done than by setting apart in every 
public library an alcove for such publications } Such 
a collection of books would develop among teachers 
a professional spirit and would give to the reading 
public a more definite knowledge of the ideal of 
culture toward which the more aggressive teachers 
are aiming. 



XII. 
- TRAINING FOR FREEDOM. 



As love is inflamed only by love, as thought is fired only by 
tliought, so freedom alone can kindle freedom. 

W. N. Hailman. 



Bear constantly in mind the truth that the aim of your discipline 

should be to produce a self-governing being; not to produce a being 

to be governed by others. 

Herbert Spencer. 



As the mind grows, the tone of authority in the teacher must 

gradually relax and justify itself by an appeal to the intelHgence and 

moral sense of the pupil. 

J. D. MuRELL. 

From simply commanding he should proceed to explain the 
reasons of his commands; from these again to the expression of 
desires and the manifestations of a generous confidence; and from 
these to the frequent option and discretion of the child, preparatory 
to the moment of giving him entirely into his own hands. 

Dr. Harris. 



XII. 
TRAINING FOR FREEDOM. 

Do not train boys to learning by force and harshness. — Plato. 

It is apparent to every observer that the discipline 
in our schools is much milder now than formerly. 
Fifty years ago corporal punishment was both by far 
more frequent and more severe than at the present 
time. The rod as an instrument of discipline is fast 
disappearing, and in many places is either absolutely 
forbidden by law or totally abolished by public 
opinion. There are fewer rules and regulations, a 
more frequent appeal to reason and persuasion rather 
than to fear of punishment, pupils are treated more 
as equals and less as subordinates, greater freedom is 
allowed them in sports, studies, and life, and in many 
cases they are admitted to a share in the government 
of the school and college. 

This relaxation of discipline may be regarded as a 
lowering of the standard, a yielding to a weak laissez 
faire spirit that underestimates the value of law and 
the merit of obedience and unduly exalts the indi- 
vidual. By some it is looked upon as a sure sign of 
the degeneracy of the times and as ominous of 
future disaster to the Republic. It is supposed to 
result either from indifference, negligence, weakness, 

1C9 



lyO STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

or from false views of law and government enter- 
tained by teachers. Tiie remedy for this state of 
things is supposed by those who entertain this view 
to lie in a return to former methods. Greater stress 
is to be laid upon the majesty of law, the dignity of 
the master, the sin of disobedience, and the merit 
there is in unhesitating, prompt submission to right- 
ful authority. It is pointed out that every govern- 
ment must be a government of law, and that 
obedience is not only a cardinal virtue but a prime 
condition of the continuance of a republican govern- 
ment. That children at school and boys in college 
are to be taught habits of obedience and that a failure 
to do this imperils the foundations of society itself. 

This view of the situation has an element of truth 
in it and challenges serious thought. If it is cor- 
rect we are in danger. Our liberties are in jeopardy. 
We should make haste to institute a reform in our 
schools with respect to discipline. 

But there is another view of the matter. This 
mildness of discipline is a sign of progress, not of 
retrogression. It is a symptom of health, not of 
disease ; an omen of good, not of evil. 

The fundamental principle that underlies our sys- 
tem of government is personal liberty. We are a 
" government of the people, by the people, and for 
the people." This accepted axiom in our political 
philosophy must of necessity condition all our think- 
ing on political and social subjects. We must either 
deny this premise or accept all that is implied in it. 
The enthronement of the people, the many, uncrowns 



TRAINING FOR FREEDOM. 171 

the king, the despot. In exalting the many to 
supreme authority we lift up the individual. The 
man takes the place of the ruler. With the banish- 
ment of kings goes all the pageantry of the king- 
dom. The great procession of crowned heads, lords, 
and ladies at the Queen's Jubilee was an anachronism 
even in royal England. It would be impossible and 
absurd in America, at least in any more serious form 
than as one of Barnum's pageants. We cannot 
teach Americans to bow the knee to mere authority, 
however venerable and imposing. The humblest 
American regards himself, and rightly, as the peer in 
real dignity of any monarch that wears a crown. He 
too is a ruler, a veritable sovereign. 

All of our institutions are modified and controlled 
by this all-powerful, ever-present spirit of freedom. 
We recognize no caste, no aristocracy, no classes. 
All are on a political level. The highest office is 
open to the lowest person if he will fit himself for it. 
The ballot is free. Every man's home is his castle. 
Freedom is his heritage. Liberty is not a privilege 
but a right. Any unnecessary restriction of the 
individual not called for by the good of the many is 
a usurpation, a crime. These notions, embodied in 
our Declaration of Independence, wrought into our 
Constitution, woven into our laws, inculcated from 
the pulpit, on the rostrum, at the fireside, permeate 
our literature, penetrate every social institution, and 
find their way into every schoolroom. The great 
body of our schoolmasters, native and " to the man- 
ner born," have themselves been educated in this 



172 



STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 



philosophy and can no more escape its influence than 
they can change their character. 

A petty officer trained at West Point — the only 
unrepublican institution remaining since slavery dis- 
appeared — may play the lordling over his helpless 
subjects, and may make much of mere authority, 
but the teacher trained in an American home and 
in our high and normal schools has little conception 
of what authority means apart from the highest con- 
sideration for the weal of the governed. Our politi- 
cal philosophy necessitates a milder discipline in 
family and school to correspond with the milder rule 
of the State. The nearer the government approaches 
to an autonomy, the nearer the individual approaches 
perfect freedom, the more liberal must be all the 
institutions under which he lives. 

The great work set for the schools of America is 
the preparation of the rising generation for citizen- 
ship in a free republic. They are to take their places 
as freemen, exercise the privilege of voting, and. 
become at once law-abiding subjects and intelligent 
lawmakers. What is the best preparation for such a 
life .-' Does it demand greater rigor in school disci- 
pline or greater liberty .-* Should the teacher empha- 
size the idea of authority or the idea of freedom 1 
Of course there must be authority in the family, the 
school, and in the State. And children are to be 
instructed in the duty and held to the practice of 
obedience. Wilful disobedience to law at school, 
disregard of rightful authority at home, are to be 
punished, together with crime, disloyalty, and treason 



TRAINING FOR FRKEDOAI. I 73 

against the State. Lawlessness, anarchy, and mob 
violence are to be held up in their true light as not 
only hostile to the State, subversive of established 
order, hurtful to society, but also as inimical to the 
best interests of the individual. Liberty is not 
license. Liberty is only self-imposed law. The 
highest conception of freedom is the action of a 
divine Being who knows no limitation ssave those 
that are self-imposed. But these restrictions are 
real. God cannot lie. The Judge of all the earth 
must do right. He is free because his actions origi- 
nate in self. He is a law to himself, but he is law. 
Necessarily there can be but one absolutely free 
Being in the universe. All others must be subject. 
Yet the highest conception of moral life is freedom, 
where all action is self-originated. Enlightened 
reason, sensitive conscience, and an upright will are 
the three great factors in the moral life that give dig- 
nity to action and ennoblement to the actor. These 
are the man. When reason recognizes truth, con- 
science urges to duty, and the will executes the right 
for its own sake, the man is free, is noble, is divine. 
In so far as he obeys law from low motives or from 
compulsion he is no longer free. Compulsory acts 
are not virtuous acts. Virtue is voluntary conformity 
to right. 

A child that grows up under subjection to author- 
ity, doing from day to day simply what is required 
and because it is required, judging himself and being 
judged by others by the standard of conformity to 
statute law, obedience to authority, is not a free 



174 -^ TUDIES IN PEDA GOGY, 

being, does not enjoy liberty, and fails utterly of 
preparation for citizenship in a free State. He may 
be harmless, innocent, peaceable, law-abiding, up- 
right, a good subject, but he is not necessarily a 
good citizen, much less a good man. To be a good 
citizen, a useful member of a free society, one must 
have on all matters of moral relations to his fellow- 
men an ethical code in the life : he must not obey 
the law but live it. To become fitted for this exalted 
state the child must early be trained to govern his 
own actions, to set bounds to his own passions and 
desires, to subject himself to reason's sway. The 
only discipline that fits for freedom is liberty. 

The trouble with most parents and teachers is that 
they govern too much and train too little. Despot- 
ism breeds lawlessness. The child overgoverned at 
home rushes into wild excesses abroad. A people 
ruled with a rod of iron rebel. Pharaoh's sceptre is 
broken by Moses' rod. Nihilism is the outgrowth of 
absolutism. The evils that threaten American 
society are exotics transplanted from the lands 
where bayonets rule. 

If freedom is man's normal state, he must early be 
prepared for it by being treated as a free being. It 
is a serious misconception of human nature to sup- 
pose that the child is not fit for freedom till he 
arrives at maturity. Even in infancy there are indi- 
cations of the power of self-control. The babe soon 
learns to suppress his cries and to control his temper. 
The little child avoids danger, regulates his sports, 
forms his own plans, and executes his own designs. 



TRAINING FOR FREEDOM. I 75 

He can easily be taught not only to recognize the 
reasonableness of the requirements made of him 
when presented to him, but to discern it for himself. 
He learns to reason and to govern himself by reason. 
A school may be largely self-governed and well gov- 
erned. It is true that children are ignorant and 
weak, and have besides an element of self-will, 
caprice, viciousness, that needs education and sup- 
port and restraint. There must be, in every school, 
checks, a veto-power. Everywhere in society there 
are these limitations of the individual. Even majori- 
ties must respect the written constitution as well as 
the rights of the minority. In all free states there is 
a senate set over against an assembly. There is an 
executive armed with a veto-power, and over all a 
court, to guard the constitution from infraction by 
the state itself. 

So there should be in the school the recognized 
necessity of a body empowered to check, control, or 
modify the rule of the mass of students when called 
for. They must not be left to themselves. But it 
must be a restriction of mere authority, arbitrary 
power only when reason fails. The occasion that 
calls for its exercise must be extraordinary. The 
students of even lower-grade schools are competent 
to govern themselves in a large degree and should be 
encouraged to do so. 

True, there will be mistakes, but the evil resulting 
from mistakes may furnish occasions for instruction. 
Men learn from their mistakes : why should not chil- 
dren } 1 he discipline of consequences is a recog- 



I 7 6 STUDIES IN FED A GOGY. 

nized element in God's education of the race. To 
feel the force of their own mistakes, to search out 
the far-reaching consequences of their own actions, 
to devise remedial measures, to sedulously avoid a 
repetition of them, is itself an invaluable training, 
an indispensable experience in preparation for life's 
active duties. Of course it is not intended to leave 
children or pupils of any age to rush into serious 
dangers and to suffer the dire results of ignorance 
and folly from which the experience and authority of 
their parents or teachers should have saved them. 
But suffering minor penalties, flowing naturally out 
of violated law, is often a sure means of leading the 
offender to a wise precaution that saves him from 
greater evils. 

There is a vast difference between learning and 
wisdom. A fool may be learned, or at least a learned 
man may be a fool. It is one thing to learn geome- 
try by studying the demonstrations of Euclid. It is 
quite another and far nobler thing to learn to geome- 
trize by inventing one's theorems and demonstra- 
tions. So too one may be a master in ethics so far 
as knowledge goes, but a weakling in the practice of 
virtue. It is not sufficient that we practise what we 
have learned from books and masters. There is a 
moral fibre, a sturdy, manly virtue, developed by 
grappling with practical moral problems, overcoming 
temptations, resisting evil, evolving principles out of 
our experiences. An ethical code born of life may 
lack in scientific completeness, but it is more likely 
to be forceful in guiding conduct than any set of 
memorized precepts. 



TRAINING FOR FREEDOM. I 77 

Pupils are to be governed. They are to be taught 
moral precepts. They are not by any means to be 
left to themselves. But what is insisted on most 
strenuously is that they are to be trained to think for 
themselves on moral subjects and to regulate their 
conduct by the results of their own thinking. They 
must be thrown gradually and wisely upon them- 
selves. The appeal must be made more and more to 
conscience and reason and less and less to fear and 
power. 

This does not prevent but rather necessitates the 
clearest and most explicit inculcation of wise pre- 
cepts and the exposition of fundamental ideas of 
right and wrong, justice, equity, loyalty, truthfulness, 
fidelity, and all the civic and social virtues. The 
highest ideal is ever to be presented to the young as 
the goal of their endeavor. This ideal becoming 
gradually clearer in outline, more complete in detail, 
at length takes its place in the imagination as an 
abiding presence, a silent, forceful mentor. The 
child trained at home and in school to judge his own 
actions by this ideal standard has an inward prompt- 
ing toward the right under all circumstances and in 
all places. This is a safeguard in temptation, an 
encouragement in trial, a nemesis in wrong, and a 
reward in victory. 

The day of blind submission to human authority is 
fast passing away. Absolutism is a bygone. In 
philosophy, religion, science, and in politics the same 
great phenomenon is seen of an awakening con- 
sciousness of freedom. The old state of things, 



178 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

despots and dungeons, inquisitors and inquisitions, 
masters and floggings, are giving way to written con- 
stitutions and the ballot, the open Bible and private 
judgment, and the teacher ruling by love. We can- 
not restore the old regime. Once gone it is gone 
forever. To prepare our children to live and act well 
their part in this modern age in our country, we 
must educate them for freedom by training them in 
freedom's ways. Education takes on new signifi- 
cance, involves new methods, necessitates a new 
spirit, when it sets for itself the high and holy task 
of training a whole vast generation of free men and 
women who shall be adequate for the duties and pre- 
pared for the privileges of lives of rational, social, 
political, religious freedom. 



XIII. 
METHODOLOGY. 



The study of methods of instruction constitutes one of the most 

important divisions of educational science. ^ 

Gabriel Compayre. 



Nothing so much clears a learner's way, helps him so much on 

in it, and makes him go easy and so far in any inquiry as a good 

method. 

John Locke. 



Learning teacheth more in one year than experience in twenty, 
and learning teacheth safely, when experience maketh more miserable 
than wise. He hazardeth sore that waxeth wise by experience. 

Roger Ascham. 



Formal logic as the exposition of the structure of mind, the form 

of its functions, is the most important part of psychology, and a key to 

all the unconscious activities of the mind. 

W. T. Harris. 



XIII. 
METHODOLOGY. 

Method will teach you to win time. — GoETHE. 

The highest outcome of instruction is not 
knowledge only, but power, and particularly the 
power to think. One needs to know not merely 
facts, but facts in their relation to other facts ; not 
only that a thing is so, but also why it is so. It is 
not enough that one should know a science : he 
needs to be able to construct a science. To learn 
to philosophize is more than learning philosophy. 
Instruction that merely imparts information falls 
short of awakening power. 

In order that teaching may stimulate thought- 
power it must result from thought-power. The 
pupil thinks as the master thinks ; he unconsciously 
imitates the master's method. If the master teaches 
without a plan, the pupil's knowledge will be form- 
less and his mind chaotic. If the teacher follows 
an intelligent system, sets before himself each day 
a definite purpose, and arranges his material with 
nice discrimination, according to a plan, adapting 
means to ends, the pupil's mind will be exercised in 
thinking correctly and will take on a logical habit. 

As a preparation for this kind of work the would- 
be teacher should study not simply formal logic as 



I 82 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

a science of thinking, but he should study also with 
greatest care methodology, or the science of in- 
struction. This is a broad subject and can be set 
forth here only in outline. 

There are certain great general principles under- 
lying the work of instruction that are followed more 
or less closely by every successful teacher. He 
need not necessarily be conscious of them any more 
than the successful writer must be distinctly con- 
scious of the principles of rhetoric, or the orator of 
the principles of elocution. Rhetoric is a systematic 
statement of the laws of good writing, and logic of 
the laws of thought. So methodology is the orderly 
arrangement of the principles of good teaching. 
Practice precedes theory. Good speakers antedate 
treatises on elocution ; men reasoned soundly long 
before the science of logic took form ; and great 
teachers taught long and well before any attempt 
was made to reduce to systematic statement the 
principles that guided them. 

Rhetoric is a guide to successful composition, 
logic abridges the labor of thinking, and the study 
of methodology may prove most helpful to him who 
aspires to succeed in teaching. It is no argument 
against the study of rhetoric and logic to say that 
men ignorant of their rules have been successful 
writers and speakers. Genius is a law to itself. 
Men of rare insight into truth come unaided to a 
knowledge of underlying principles which need to 
be formulated, illustrated, and taught to the average 
mortal. 



METHODOLOGY. 1 83 

Method should be distinguished from methods. 
The general principles of teaching are common to 
instruction in any branch of knowledge, differing 
only in application according to the nature of the 
subject taught. There is a method of teaching 
geography, a method of teaching arithmetic, a 
method of teaching grammar, and a method of 
teaching every branch of human knowledge. To 
attain the highest success in any field of instruction, 
one must needs study method in its relation to 
that particular branch of science that he wishes 
to teach. 

But one who studies method only in connection 
with some particular branch of instruction is liable 
to be narrow and one-sided. One who tries to learn 
painting by studying Raphael becomes a copyist, 
as pointed out by Sir Joshua Reynolds. While one 
who studies the principles of painting as illustrated 
by Raphael and the other great artists may himself 
become an artist, an original creator. One who 
should study rhetoric by the examination and imi- 
tation of the writings of Carlyle only would never 
become a master of style. 

One who studies methods, and not method, is 
liable to mistake devices for principles, and clever- 
ness for science. He is especially liable to fall into 
the error of supposing that there is only one method 
of teaching a subject, and that the particular one 
which he has learned. The criticism of pedantry 
often brought against normal students, and of 
charlatanism against normal instruction, finds its 



184 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

explanation at times in the failure to study- 
methodology and in the undue prominence given 
to methods. 

As preliminary to the study of methodology there 
should be a course in logic. In every act of 
teaching there are two parties, the teacher and the 
taught, the instructor and the pupil. The teacher 
cannot teach except in so far as the pupil learns. 
Knowledge -giving is conditioned on knowledge- 
getting. The one cannot go on without the other. 
He who teaches, therefore, must first of all have 
regard to the laws according to which one learns. 
If he violates or ignores these laws, he is doomed to 
failure. Logic in its broad sense has to do with 
acquisition, and one wlio teaches should have an 
explicit knowledge of those processes of mind which 
are engaged in attaining knowledge. Without at- 
tempting a full exposition of the matter here, let 
it suffice to indicate some of the more prominent 
topics that constitute a sort of presupposition to 
method. 

The sources of knowledge are either observation, 
consciousness, intuition, testimony, authority, or 
thinking. These should be studied, and the pecul- 
iar function of each clearly discriminated. 

Especially important is a knowledge of the 
processes of analysis, comparison, judgment, infer- 
ence, induction, generalization, classification, de- 
duction, verification, and proof. Many a young 
teacher undertakes the important task of instructing 
young minds without ever having spent an hour 



ME THOD OLOGY. 1 8 5 

in the study of these processes. Logic is not 
ordinarily taught in high schools, from which issue 
forth year by year so many teachers, and even in 
normal schools the subject is likely to be over- 
looked. 

Closely allied to these logical processes are others 
that belong rather to imparting instruction than 
to acquiring knowledge. Among these are : defi- 
nition, description, narration, illustration, arrange- 
ment. Each of these processes has an order and 
laws of its own. They need not be set forth here. 
They are of the very essence of instruction. No 
progress can be made without them. Definition 
may be faulty or even false; description, inaccurate; 
narration, obscure; illustration, non-himinous ; and 
arrangement, without a plan. Under such circum- 
stances teaching must be weak and its results very 
unsatisfactory. 

Before entering upon the work of giving instruc- 
tion on any subject to a class of pupils at school, 
the teacher needs to consider three things. 

First. The analysis of the subject. Every 
science has its logical articulation and can be 
separated into its distinct parts. Most subjects can 
be presented under a very few great topics with a 
greater number of sub-topics. In thinking, there 
are two great fundamental processes, discrimination 
and assimilation. In arithmetic there are two prime 
operations, combining and separating. All the ani- 
mals of the world may be classed in five great 
groups. Each topic can be subdivided into its 



l86 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

constituent parts, and these into their parts or 
elements. It is not until this complete analysis of 
the subject, following the lines of the organic 
structure or logical constitution of the matter, has 
been finished that the teacher is prepared to 
enter upon the work of exposition. He cannot 
intelligently set forth to others what is not clearly 
grasped by himself. 

Method seeks to determine those recognized 
principles of division by whose aid any subject may 
be resolved into its topics. Nothing is more ser- 
viceable to the young teacher than this preliminary 
survey of arithmetic, grammar, geography, and other 
common-school studies in their topics, or outlines. 
The logic of the science is studied apart from the 
multitude of facts which it embraces. 

Second. When this preliminary survey is com- 
pleted, the next great question for the teacher to 
determine is the order of presentation of the topics. 

Analysis and synthesis. It is a much disputed 
question what the nature, function, value, and, re- 
lation to each other of these two processes are in 
teaching. By some they are regarded as the 
essential elements in method, while others would 
discard them entirely. It is safe to say that every 
subject presented to the child, except primitive ideas, 
such as hardness, smoothness, straight line, needs 
to be analyzed and his attention must be directed 
successively to its parts, or qualities. A sentence 
is made up of words ; words, of letters ; letters, of 
parts. The earth comprises land and water. A 



ME THOD OLOGY. 1 8 7 

metal has lustre, specific gravity, and other qualities. 
Government comprises three departments, legisla- 
tive, judicial, and executive. In all subjects the 
instructor must resort to analysis, and must lead 
his pupils by its means from the contemplation of a 
whole to its parts. In cases of review, and in 
presenting new subjects to minds mature enough to 
follow a process of logical division, the analytic 
process saves time and labor, while in some subjects, 
as in geometry, for example, the process is neces- 
sarily and almost wholly analytical. 

In many cases it is better, particularly with young 
pupils, to begin synthetically by presenting one 
thing, or part, at a time, and, by joining part to part, 
lead to successive generalizations until the mind 
grasps the subject as a whole. Elementary geog- 
raphy should be so taught. History, in its earlier 
stages. Natural history and the physical sciences 
should always be taught to beginners synthetically. 

In teaching synthetically, resort must frequently 
be had to analysis in making clear difficult points 
that arise, and in reviewing the work accomplished 
at different stages of progress. 

The two processes are parts of one operation, and 
can seldom be wholly separated. They explain each 
other. 

Modern methods of instruction emphasize the 
importance of the synthetic process of presenting 
in the introduction of a subject facts and concrete 
instances rather than definitions ; processes rather 
than rules ; induction rather than deduction. 



1 88 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

Nothing is clearer than the necessity of going 
from the concrete, that which appeals to the senses, 
to the abstract. Object -teaching and objective 
teaching play an important role in all training of 
the young, and in the introduction of new subjects 
in most stages of teaching. Distinctness, clearness, 
and vividness are often unattainable withou the 
use of objects, models, or pictures. As soon as 
possible objects should be discarded lest they foster 
an indolent habit of thinking. 

Scarcely less obvious is the law of proceeding 
from the known to the unknown. Knowledge begins 
in sense discrimination and individual experiences 
of the qualities of matter. It continues by constant 
assimilation of new experiences to the old. Every 
new experience is compared with the old and 
grasped by its resemblance or its contrast. In 
number a child first learns to count ; then adding 
is another way of counting ; multiplying, a short 
way of adding ; squaring, a distinct way of multi- 
plying. Seeking to connect what is to be taught 
with what has already been learned is the most 
economic way of increasing the stock of knowledge. 

Ideas and words. No absolute law can be laid 
down further than to say that in early childhood 
usually the idea should first be awakened and then 
the name given, but even here are many exceptions. 

The laws of dependence, of cause and effect, of 
sequence in time, of contiguity, of contrast, of 
variety, and of passing from the simple to the 
complex, all claim notice in any discussion of 
method. 



METHODOLOGY. 1 89 

Third. Having settled upon what topics he will 
present and the order of their presentation, several 
other matters will claim attention, such as the 
following : — ■ 

Oral teaching. What are its limits, its advantages, 
disadvantages, and condition ? 

Textbooks. How far shall the student be re- 
quired to master the exact words of the book ? 
How shall the book be supplemented .'' 

Assignment of lessons. How shall lessons be 
assigned, and how much } What explanations or 
hints and suggestions shall be given.? 

Preparation of lessons. What help shall the 
student receive, and in what way .'' 

The recitation. How shall this be conducted, by 
question and answer or topically } 

Reviews, tests, examinations, marking, ranking, 
all have a bearing upon successful instruction. 

Second to no other in the whole subject of in- 
struction is that of the motives that should be 
appealed to and the best means of arousing them. 

Methodology includes also an investigation into 
the educational values absolute and relative of 
different branches of learning. 

It will be seen that these elements of method can 
be studied aside from the teaching of any particular 
branch of instruction, and they are involved more or 
less in all teaching. 

The study of methods in any special branches will 
be greatly facilitated and be lifted upon a higher 
philosophical plane, if it follows as an application of 



190 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

these general elements according to the peculiarities 
of the subject to be taught. Methodology may be 
studied after students have investigated the method 
of teaching one subject. 

A comprehensive study of methodology as here 
outlined, until the fundamental principles are clearly 
grasped and their varied application in teaching the 
several branches of science familiarly understood, 
will make the teacher's work scientific instead of 
empirical. It will greatly facilitate it, enabling him 
to accomplish not only what could not otherwise be 
done, but to reach his ends quickly, surely, and 
easily. Such preparation will enable him, while 
imparting knowledge, to guide the minds of his 
pupils so that they will be led to use all their powers 
appropriately, actively, efficiently, so as both to 
assimilate the knowledge offered and also to grow 
in ability to observe and to think. Thus taught, 
they may become self-reliant, aggressive, profound, 
practical reasoners. Knowledge is transmuted into 
wisdom and instruction issues in power. 



XIV. 

THE MAN AND HIS METHOD. 



Teaching is a lifelong learning of how to deal with human 

minds. 

Edward Turing. 



In education every teacher must have some mode of exhibiting 
the notions he has of his art, and this mode is his method. 

Joseph Payne. 

Machine methods are necessary wherever machine teachers are 

found. 

John Hancock. 

He only can teach who looks down upon the elements of his 
department from the heights of broad and solid attainment. 

M. B. Anderson. 

The health and progress of every great science, such as educa- 
tion, depend upon continual difference, upon new ideas, and 
experiments carried out to give effect to such ideas, upon the never- 
ending struggle between the many different forms and methods, each 
to excel the other. It cannot be too often repeated that uniformity 
means arrest of growth and consequent decay; diversity means life, 
growth, and adaptation without limit. 

'A Protest," The Nineteenth Ccntitry, November, 1888. 



XIV. 

THE MAN AND HIS METHOD. 

The true teacher teaches himself: that is, he impresses his own 
character, his own intellectual and moral habits, on his pupils. 

— Joseph Alden. 

Standing one day near the Mansion House in 
London, my attention was attracted by a somewhat 
extraordinary turnout. Addressing a policeman at 
hand, I inquired, " Whose carriage is that .'' " " That," 
said he, with severe and impressive dignity, "is the 
Lord Mayor and his carriage." 

What struck me was the magnificence of the 
equipage, the gilded wagon, the prancing horses, 
the liveried attendants ; while that which impressed 
the sturdy Briton was the majesty of him who rode 
within. I have reflected upon the incident many 
times since, and have learned from it some useful 
lessons. 

Much is said in our day, in reference to teaching, 
about the importance of method. Schools have been 
founded to give instruction in method. It has seemed 
to me, in some instances certainly, that men had an 
exaggerated idea as to the importance of method ; 
that they had given such exclusive attention to the 
method as to overlook the man. 

The man is greater than his method. The power 

193 



194 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

of every true teacher is in himself, his character, 
his attainments, his spirit, his personahty. A robust, 
vigorous man, with high aims and enthusiastic devo- 
tion to his work, deeply in love with any great 
subject in which he has steeped his own soul, will 
awaken something of his own zeal in the minds of 
his pupils, kindle within them a love of learning, 
arouse their dormant energies, call into exercise 
their awakening faculties, impart to them of his 
own knowledge, and incite them to independent 
research. His method is simply his way of doing 
this. He originates his method. Socrates, with his 
devout love of truth, his unfeigned humility, his keen 
detection of the shallowness of men's pretensions, 
had a way of bringing them by a series of questions 
to a consciousness of their own ignorance and 
revealing to them the necessity of a reexamination 
of the very foundations of their pretended knowledge. 
Not the Socratic method, but the man Socrates, was 
the mighty power in Athens. A public instructor 
who thinks to become great merely by the use of the 
Socratic method of questioning adopts the policy of 
the ass which donned the lion's skin. 

A teacher may be great in spite of his method. 
The methods of Michael Angelo were faulty, and it 
is not difficult for a critic to point out defects in his 
work. Men of less genius attempting to do as he 
did would meet only with failure ; nevertheless, 
Michael Angelo was a great artist, his works are 
imperishable, his name will be as enduring as art 
itself. The magnificence of his conceptions, though 



THE MAN AND HIS METHOD. 1 95 

imperfectly embodied, lent a new majesty to archi- 
tecture, painting, and sculpture, and lovers of art go 
in throngs to the Sistine Chapel, and to view his 
matchless statue of Moses. The method of Pesta- 
lozzi, crude and faulty though it was, could not 
entirely prevent the achievement of at least partial 
success in his philanthropic schemes. Carlyle was 
a great writer in spite of his barbarous English. In 
our schools to-day may be found numerous teachers 
who, notwithstanding the most faulty methods, are 
accomplishing great results, not only in imparting 
much useful instruction, but in awakening mind, 
developing character, and inciting to noble living. 
Nevertheless, every teacher who aspires to the 
highest excellence should be master of method. His 
task is one of infinite difficulty, and calls not only 
for character of rare nobility, talents of high order, 
and liberal learning, but also for the greatest skill in 
the adjustment of means to ends. Method is applied 
philosophy. A teacher who achieves success by 
virtue of the intensity of his personality, in spite 
of the faultiness of his method, might be still more 
successful by greater regard to the means used in his 
endeavors. Elocution is not oratory : it is too often 
mere empty sound. Peter the Hermit in his beggar's 
garb moved all Europe by his uncouth speech ; and 
yet Demosthenes strove with masterly will to over- 
come defects and achieve a style and manner which 
should serve as a medium for the conveyance of his 
own great thoughts to the minds and hearts of his 
countrymen, and incite them to deeds of lofty valor. 



196 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

The studied arts in the use of voice, gesture, 
manner, lend a charm and potency even to "words 
that breathe and thoughts that burn." No teacher 
can safely neglect the added power imparted by a 
correct method. 

Teachers should strive constantly to attain new 
degrees of excellence in method. Perfection ever 
eludes even the most ambitious. The greatest 
master is yet a tyro. There is no "The Method." 
Method is the outgrowth of philosophy, and must 
adjust itself to the laws of mind and to the 
exigencies of science. What are the laws of mind.'* 
What constitutes education } What is the educa- 
tional value of each of the sciences .-' are some of 
the questions that remain to vex the educator. 
Progressive inquiry is possible in each direction, 
and each successive attainment admits, if it does 
not demand, a modification in method. Method 
must likewise recognize the individuality of the pupil. 
That which may be most potent with one may prove 
utterly impotent with another. Method easily 
degenerates into routine — dead formalism. Great 
reforms are often nothing more than desperate 
endeavors to break away from this lifeless formality. 
Iconoclasm becomes a virtue, and empiricism meri- 
torious. Erasmus and Ulrich von Hutten were the 
forerunners of those who reconstructed the world's 
religious teaching. Every teacher should himself 
be a perpetual reformer. 

The man and his method exert a reciprocal 
influence upon each other. A growing manhood, 



THE MAN AND I/IS METHOD. 1 97 

characterized by loftier aims, wider research, greater 
attainments, deepened experience, manifests itself in 
improved methods of work. On the other hand the 
increased skill secures better results, leads to larger 
endeavors and broader opportunities, kindles new 
enthusiasm, and begets enlargement of soul. 



XV. 
METHOD IN QUESTIONING. 



The art of asking questions is not a simple art. 

E. E. White. 



Socrates spent his life in teaching, and in teaching in an original 
method, which has preserved his name. He had the genius of interro- 
gation. To question all whom he met, either at the gymnasium or in 
the streets; to question the sophists in order to convince them of their 
errors and to confound their arrogance, and presumptious young men 
in order to teach them the truth of which they were ignorant; to 
question great and small, statesmen and masons, now Pericles and now 
a shopkeeper; to question always and everywhere, in order to compel 
every one to form clear ideas; such was the constant occupation and 

passion of his life. 

Gabriel Compayre. 



XV. 
METHOD IN QUESTIONING. 

One of the most important means of stimulating thought is ques- 
tioning. — F. B. Palmer. 

In all the earlier stages of education the chief 
business of the teacher is to arouse and direct the 
activity of the pupil. All mental development and 
growth in knowledge is conditioned upon this 
activity. The pupil must desire to know, he must 
observe and think for himself. No receptivity, how- 
ever great, suffices. Indeed, receptivity is active. 
The mind must be on the alert, eager for truth, 
rejoicing in action. Even when the teacher instructs, 
pours into the mind facts and truths, it is only as the 
pupil lays hold upon these facts and assimilates 
them by thought that they are really communicated. 

Most children are endowed with a fair degree of 
native energy that manifests itself, among other 
ways, in a curiosity that leads them to investigate 
nature and to seek information from their compan- 
ions. When properly nourished, this curiosity is 
sufficient to insure to them a full development of 
their powers and a large acquisition of knowledge. 

Too often, however, by neglect or by false 

methods, this divine gift of curiosity is stifled. 

A recent writer, alluding to his seventeen years' 

201 



202 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

experience as a professor in one of our oldest col- 
leges, says : " I am more and more impressed, and 
often sadly impressed, with the failure on the part of 
college students to manifest that intellectual curi- 
osity, and to put themselves in that mental attitude, 
that shall make their studies truly educating to 
them." 

Any system of education which consists wholly 
or chiefly, or largely even, in simply requiring stu- 
dents to commit to memory certain lessons, whether 
truths of history, rules of grammar, or facts of 
science, tends to stupefy the mind and to crush 
out that curiosity without which no satisfactory 
progress is possible. Any plan of classical study 
that wholly or chiefly confines the student's mind 
to the words of the text, their literal meaning and 
grammatical structure, is essentially vicious. The 
text of the classical author should be made the 
occasion of a wide range of thinking on the part 
of the student. There should be questions from 
the teacher as to geography, history, philosophy, 
religion, etc., suggested by the text ; questions call- 
ing for an expression of opinion as to the sentiments 
advanced, judgment as to the wisdom of things 
done, comparison of men, cities, events, etc. ; in 
short, questions that serve to put the mind of the 
American student of a classical author in the same 
state, as far as possible, as that of a student contem- 
porary with the author himself. 

Questions are often framed simply with a view 
to test the memory. The examiner is satisfied when 



METHOD IN QUESTIONING. 203 

the student by his answers shows that he has stored 
away, subject to call, the various fragments of knowl- 
edge set him for lessons. It is important, of course, 
that the memory shall do its work. It is an invaluable 
power. Like the ammunition train in an army, it 
needs to be well supplied and always at hand. The 
bravest soldiers and most skilful gunners are largely 
dependent upon its proximity and fulness for effec- 
tive service. But after all it is merely a supply 
train. Ammunition is only a dead weight and an 
encumbrance unless there is courage, wisdom, skill, 
and efficiency in its use. Memoriter recitation is 
hurtful, rather than helpful, just in proportion as 
it is accepted as a substitute for earnest intellectual 
effort, involving the putting forth of all our powers. 
One hour of original thinking is worth a week of 
memoriter recitation. 

The mind is stimulated to action by the presence 
of real things in nature and art. The natural phe- 
nomena appeal strongly to the child's curiosity ; but 
the mystery of nature is too profound, the difficulty 
of understanding its laws is too great, for the 
unaided student. The child of nature is always a 
child. No man or generation of men left to them- 
selves would or could make much progress in the 
conquest of the secrets of the universe. It is the 
accumulated knowledge and wisdom of the ages, 
increased little by little and taught by one generation 
to another, that is man's heritage. The teacher 
initiates the student into these mysteries, gives him 
the key to this great treasure-house, enthrones him 



204 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

as ruler over nature's great forces, and teaches him 
how to subject them to his own uses. 

To leave him to his unaided efforts is to doom him 
to failure and to consign him to despair. To attempt 
to lay upon him, ready made, the accumulations of 
science and the formulas of philosophy is to crush 
him with riches. The teacher is to put him into 
right relations with the world about him and that 
greater world within him, and by hint, suggestion, 
and question lead him to put forth all his powers of 
observation, introspection, and thought, until he 
comes to self-conscious freedom and to the mastery 
of his surroundings. 

The chief agent in the hands of the teacher for 
this great work is the question. Not the lifeless 
interrogatory printed at the bottom of the page, a 
sort of birdtrack on the rock to show where a living 
creature had once stood in some former age ; not a 
mere formal quest after the contents of the memory, 
like a pail dipped into a cistern ; but a living ques- 
tion designed to stimulate inquiry, provoke thought, 
arouse the imagination, and to lead the mind to 
exert its best energies in the endeavor to solve for 
itself life's riddles. Thus led into face-to-face 
contact with things which he must observe for him- 
self as though his eye had first looked upon them; 
into an investigation of nature's laws and forces, 
which under helpful guidance he is to ascertain and 
formulate for himself as though no science had yet 
been begun ; into communion with himself, observ- 
ing, analyzing, classifying, and philosophizing upoa 



METHOD IN QUESTIONING. 205 

his own powers ; into a philosophic study of man in 
society and history, the student follows in the foot- 
steps of the race as an investigator, a discoverer, a 
philosopher, with this difference, that rightly guided 
he alone does more in a single lifetime to compel 
from nature her secrets than all men in all previous 
time have done. 

The questions that can be asked, and the answers 
to which constitute the whole body of knowledge, 
whether science or philosophy, can be reduced to a 
very few classes. It is possible for a wise teacher 
in a few years to so question a pupil that all his 
powers shall be aroused, all the sources of informa- 
tion be opened to him and at his command, and so 
that he shall possess a method of inquiry himself 
which renders his progress swift, certain, and satis- 
factory. 

Ten categories will, perhaps, exhaust the list. 
They are : What } Of what kind 1 How many .-• 
How much .? Who } Where .? When .? How .? Why .? 
What then.'' One who is accustomed to seek an 
answer to all of these inquiries, to follow " the con- 
nection and dependence of ideas till the mind is 
brought to the source on which it bottoms," is 
already, in a very large sense, an educated person. 
He alone is a good teacher who is, not like Peter 
Lombard, a " master of sentences," but, like Socra- 
tes, a master of questions. 

Let us look, simply by way of illustration, at the 
significance and compass of these questions, i. 
What } One of the primary and fundamental acts 



206 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

in the process of thinking is that of discrimination, 
the separation of the object of thought from all 
else ; for as soon as the mind gives attention to a 
sensation, it must localize it as a sensation of sight, 
of hearing, etc., and then must refer it to some 
definite object as its source or occasion. Every 
act of perception is an act of discrimination, of men- 
tal concentration. Every object of thought has its 
own characteristics, its individuality, and can be 
known to the observer only by an effort. Suppose 
a child is learning to read, and that there is placed 
before it the word "cat." The teacher may pro- 
nounce the word and the child echo it. This process, 
repeated often enough, will serve to fix the word 
in a sort of mechanical way in his mind, and to 
form a loose association between its written form, 
spoken sound, and its meaning ; but it is only when 
the child has really directed its mental energies upon 
the word, observed its form and sound, discriminated 
it from other words, noted its peculiarities, that he 
actually learns it. The mere name is the least part ; 
the particular word, as unlike all other words and 
with a character all its own, is another matter. So 
too in learning about a veritable cat the child needs 
to see and handle, to distinguish, observe, and com- 
pare, until it has a definite, clear, familiar acquaint- 
ance with it, so that when he thinks " cat " the idea 
has distinct contents. The same process of mind 
which the child uses in making his first acquaintance 
with the elements of learning must be used by the 
trained scientist or philosopher in pushing his 
researches into the farthest boundaries of inquiry. 



METHOD IN QUESTIONING. 20/ 

The question What ? calls not only for observation, 
discrimination, analysis, comparison, but for naming, 
defining, and classifying. The misapplication of 
names is a glaring fault with most people, quite 
as characteristic of many so-called educated people 
as of the illiterate, and results largely from the habit 
of telling to children the names of objects, without 
requiring from them any exercise of thought in 
carefully discriminating the precise thing named 
from all other things and the associating with it the 
exact name appropriate to it. 

To require of students careful definitions of all 
new terms used is a valuable aid in giving definite- 
ness to their ideas. The definitions learned from 
books may or may not be helpful ; but the definitions 
made by the pupil, the boundary which he himself 
draws around the idea represented by the word he 
uses, necessitates thought and gives definiteness of 
apprehension. 

Defining leads to classifying. The classification 
which the student is led to make for himself in 
answer to the teacher's What is it .-* provokes a 
higher order of thinking than is involved in observ- 
ing or naming. At first he will hesitate and blunder, 
and will need help — ^help, however, which is usually 
best given, not by direct information, but by other 
questions. 

2. Closely akin to the question What } is the 
question Of what kind } This calls for a description 
of the object : whether material or spiritual; animal, 
vegetable, or mineral ; homogeneous or organized. 



2o8 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

It calls for parts, qualities, and properties. The 
teacher, by proper questions, may lead the student 
to put himself into all possible relations with an 
object, that he may describe it as it appears — if a 
material thing — to eye, ear, touch, etc. Every 
object of thought can be viewed with reference to 
certain characteristic phases. A mineral has form, 
lustre, hardness, specific gravity, etc.; a bird has 
size, parts, plumage, habits, etc.; a man has age, 
size, features, complexion, carriage, etc. Country 
has latitude, longitude, altitude, boundary, surface, 
slope, soil, climate, products, etc. 

Observation, which lies at the basis of all knowl- 
edge getting and conditions all intellectual growth, 
must be the pupil's own act. It is best called into 
exercise not by telling him what some one else has 
seen, nor what to see, but by repeated inquiries as to 
what he himself sees, has seen, or may see. Thus 
directed, he will form a habit of careful, accurate, 
exhaustive, and comprehensive observation, and of 
clear, concise, complete description. At some stages 
of culture, and in reference to some things, the 
habit of requiring the pupil to represent the object 
of his thought by a drawing on paper, slate, or 
blackboard is an invaluable aid in securing definite- 
ness of conception. That which can be pictured 
must first exist clearly in the mind. 

It is obvious that the questions What } and Of 
what kind } call for statements of the nature not 
only of those objects of thought which are material 
and appeal to the senses, but also of those objects 



METHOD IN QUESTIONING. 2O9 

which are immaterial ; such as the mind and its 
states and activities as revealed by consciousness, 
as well as those subtler conceptions of time, space, 
number, personal identity, etc., that spring up in 
the mind, not out of observation nor yet out of 
consciousness, but intuitively. 

That is a very shallow view of knowledge and of 
education which asserts that all our knowledge 
comes through the senses, and that the mind can 
only be trained through the activity of the percep- 
tive faculties. The pupil is to be led by questions 
to seek to give a rational account of the contents 
of his mind that have not had a sense origin and 
have no sense relations. "Our age inclines at pres- 
ent to the superstition that man is able, by means 
of simple sense perception, to attain to a knowledge 
of the essence of things and thereby dispense with 
the trouble of thinking." ^ 

3. How many .-' The moment a child distinguishes 
one thing from another of the same kind, there arises 
in his mind the idea of number, and, when once 
awakened, this idea is never lost. It becomes one 
of the essential forms of the mind's activity accord- 
ing to which it contemplates the world. 

The whole philosophy of numbers, their properties, 
combinations, and relations, should be taught by 
questions rather than by instruction. The names — 
which are arbitrary — must be given, the processes 
may be exhibited, but the rationale of the process 
must be seen and not told. Nothing, perhaps, is 

^ Rosenkranz. 



2 1 S TUDIES IN PEDA GOGY. 

more characteristic of what may be termed the 
" new education " than the improved way of teach- 
ing mathematics. When the child knows one book, 
one apple, etc., he is shown two books and asked. 
How many.? One is removed. Now how many.? 
Nothing is told him unless in answer to his own 
questions, but by incessant questioning he is led to 
separate and combine and describe the act and 
result, and thus think his way through the science. 
Arithmetic thus developed is a valuable mental 
gymnastic; taught as it often is, it dwarfs and 
cripples the mind, 

4. The question How much .? suggests standards 
of measurement — foot, yard, pound, gallon, etc. 
The ordinary method of teaching weights and meas- 
ures is to require pupils to commit the tables to 
memory, often without their ever having seen a 
standard of either weight or measure. Such knowl- 
edge is of little or no practical worth, and of the 
least possible value as a means of mental discipline. 
But when a quantity of matter — beans, water — is 
given to the pupil, and he is required to determine 
its quantity by actual measurement in answer to 
the demand How much .? he acquires definite, valu- 
able knowledge and is constrained to mental activity 
of high disciplinary value. When he is required to 
estimate the same quantity of matter in terms of 
different standards of measure, — so many pints, 
I quarts, pecks, litres; so many metres, yards, paces, 
etc., — the entire subject of reduction, so obscure to 
many students, may be developed, and thus a habit 



METHOD IN QUESTIONING. 211 

of mind established which in after-life is of the 
utmost value in enabling him to view the same 
persons, events, or systems of government, philos- 
ophy, etc., from different points of view. 

5. Who } In the whole range of human study no 
subject has deeper interest than human beings. We 
sustain intimate relations to those about us, and 
individual biography has for us a perennial interest. 
The question Who .'' directs the thought of the 
student to the following points in the biography : 
(i) Name. (2) Ancestry. (3) Birth : time, place. 
(4) Education. (5) Career. (6) Death : time, place, 
circumstances. (7) Estimate of character. A mere 
memorizing of the facts of biography is of little 
avail in the work of education ; but when the pupil, 
under direction of the teacher and in answer to his 
searching questions, is led to think his way to a 
clear understanding of tl\e facts ; to a lively interest 
in the personality of the individual, an independent 
judgment of his character and actions, and to make 
a practical application of the lessons learned to life's 
problems, biography is at once entertaining, instruc- 
tive, and quickening. It is invaluable as a training 
for the judgment. Passing over the question (6) 
Where } with its suggestions of direction, distance, 
latitude, longitude, altitude, and the more difficult 
inquiries into space ; and (7) the question When .-' 
that brings up so many thoughts of time and its 
measurement, I pass to (8) the question How.? 
This provokes thought as to the manner, means, 
or instruments with which any event has been 



2 12 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

brought about. Everywhere about us is a vast 
organism, a most complex scheme of means and ends. 
What are the adjustments used in that exquisite 
bit of machinery, the human body .'' What are the 
processes in human thought } How do the great 
forces of light, heat, electricity, generate t 

In all stages of education there is imperative need, 
if any high results are to be reached, that the pupil 
should be led to independent inquiry ; be required 
to answer questions not in the textbook ; to solve 
problems for whose solution the book gives at most 
only a hint. To stimulate the mind to invention, 
whether in designing, in mechanical construction, 
in arrangement of arguments, or in the elaboration 
of a scheme of philosophy, is a part of that higher 
culture so much needed and so little realized. 

9 and lo. The questions Why } and What then.-' 
seek for reasons, purpose, causes, and effects. The 
senses give us facts, the reason seeks for philosophy. 
At a very early stage of the student's education 
should begin the habit of thinking with a view of 
discovering those deep thoughts of God which are 
everywhere embodied in the universe. Man is a 
rational being, and the goal of culture is rationality. 
It is a serious defect in mental habit when the mind 
rests satisfied with a comprehension of mere facts 
without a comprehension of their relations. Facts, 
like food, are useful only as they have been assimi- 
lated. The possession of facts does not constitute 
culture. Facts are- only the starting-point and not 
the goal. They are the means of culture. Their 



METHOD IN QUESTIONING. 213 

chief value is that of suggesting thought. "The 
observing man collects facts, and the reflecting man 
explains facts." They are indispensable in any 
scheme of thought, just as stone, wood, and other 
material things are needed for the embodiment of 
the architect's ideal of a cathedral ; but the thought 
that plans, uses, and everywhere subordinates the 
material to its own purposes is greater than the 
material. 

A mind trained to think under the spur of ques- 
tions finds for every effect a cause ; underneath 
phenomena he sees laws. Facts have their philos- 
ophy. The universe is a cosmos. We live under 
the reign of law; order takes the place of confusion. 
There is a philosophy of history and a science of 
life. The goal of study is the ability to philoso- 
phize. Philosophy cannot be taught : it must be 
created. Nothing is true for the mind which it 
has not thought out. The mind is self-active, must 
make its own creed, evolve its own philosophy. 
The universe is to each that which each thinks it 
to be. Other men's thoughts may help us by way 
of suggestion or test, or even by provoking a reac- 
tion against what we deem error, which enables us 
to reach conclusions that are more nearly in accord- 
ance with the reality of things as we see them. 

That teacher does the most for his pupil who by 
wise questioning stimulates his powers, leads to an 
inquiry into the facts about him and within him, 
their nature and relations, draws from him such an 
exercise of his powers of observation, imagination, 



2 1 4 STUDIES IN PEDA GOGY. 

and thinking that he forms an original, independent 
judgment of things presented to his mind, and elab- 
orates for himself a philosophy. 

The philosophy of questioning, then, is this : 
Questioning is to be used chiefly as a means of 
awakening interest, directing the attention, arous- 
ing curiosity, stimulating thought, suggesting lines 
of inquiry and sources of information. It is not so 
much a test of attainment as a stimulant to action. 
The grade or difficulty of the question must be 
adapted to the strength of the student, and its 
character to the peculiarity of his mind. The order 
of succession of questions will necessarily be sug- 
gested partly by the nature of the subject (logical 
order) and partly by the special power or effort to 
be evoked (pedagogical order). The real pedagogue 
— child leader — is the child questioner. To ques- 
tion well is to teach well. 



XVI. 
METHOD OF TEACHING ARITHMETIC. 



Arithmetical language is the expression of arithmetical ideas. 

Edward Brooks. 



We cannot too strongly impress upon the teacher's mind that 

each lesson in arithmetic must be at the same time a lesson in 

language. 

E. V. DeGraff. 



A child's seeming stupidity in learning arithmetic may, perhaps, 

be a proof of intelligence and good sense. 

Maria Edgeworth. 



The method of introducing each subject is such that the student 
is led to truth in the path of the original investigator — certainly the 
most natural and delightful road to the acquisition of knowledge. 

W. J. Milne. 



XVI. 
METHOD OF TEACHING ARITHMETIC. 

The knowledge of number relations adds very much to the child's 
life. — Friedrich Froebel. 

Arithmetic should be so taught as to secure a 
high degree of intellectual discipline, awakening the 
observing powers, stimulating analysis, comparison, 
judgment, abstraction, generalization, and so as to 
give to the student practical skill in business compu- 
tations. It is preeminently a thought study, and only 
incidentally a memory study. The two chief things 
to be striven for are accuracy and facility. 

The design of this paper is to set forth in brief 
some of the more salient features of what is believed 
to be a philosophical method of procedure. 

A conception of number — one and other — may 
be awakened in the mind of a child at a very early 
age. As soon as he can comprehend such simple 
questions as, where is your hand ? where is your 
other hand ? he is prepared for the request, show me 
one hand ; show me two hands. 

Ideas of consecutive numbers should be awakened 
by the contemplation of groups of objects, such as I, 
II, HI, nil, IIIII, o, oo, ooo, oooo, ooooo. Sticks, 
blocks, rings, beads, and other familiar objects grouped 
in ones, twos, threes, etc., will soon awaken definite 
conceptions of these simple numbers. 

23.7 



2l8 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

As soon as the idea two, three, etc., is clearly 
awakened the term should be given to designate the 
number. The child should be taught to count not 
by rote one, two, three, etc., but by grouping objects, 
and applying to each group its proper number name. 
Counting is primarily grouping. The order of count- 
ing should be learned by comparison of one object 
with two objects, I, II, of two with three, II, III, 
until he becomes familiar with the idea of regular 
increase by one — I, II, III, IIII, one and one, two 
and one, three and one, etc. 

When sufficient familiarity has been acquired with 
the simple ideas one, two, three, as applied to objects, 
he may be led to perform fundamental operations of 
combining and separating, adding, multiplying, sub- 
tracting, and dividing. 

The child should be led to recognize that multi- 
plying is but a short way of adding the same num- 
bers ; that division and subtraction are kindred opera- 
tions, while subtraction is the reverse of addition, 
and division of multiplication. The " Grube " method 
of teaching the four fundamental rules simultaneously 
is philosophical. 

The first year in school — from five to six — may 
be profitably limited in number work to acquainting 
the little ones with numbers from one to ten. 

During this early stage a good deal of collateral 
knowledge of form, color, size, direction, etc., may 
be acquired ; and besides, some skill in the use of 
language of numbers. 

When the child enters upon a higher stage of a 



METHOD OF TEACHING ARITHMETIC. 219 

more extended study of addition, subtraction, multi- 
plication, and division, he should be led to construct 
his own tables. These tables should then be thor- 
oughly memorized and rendered familiar by extended 
drill. 

The successive steps are, observation, thought, 
expression, memory, use, involving imagination and 
reason. Original problems should be required at 
every stage. 

A knowledge of fractions should be based upon 
division. To separate an apple into two equal parts 
is to divide by two into halves. To divide by three 
is to create thirds, etc. 

The child should be led to think of an apple, for 
example, as one whole, two halves, three thirds, four 
fourths, etc. ; to think of one half as two fourths. 
Addition of fractions should be taught by first adding 
halves to halves, then thirds to thirds, then by adding 
halves and fourths, thirds and sixths, etc. 

A cardinal rule to be observed at every step is to 
illustrate principles by the smallest, simplest exam- 
ples. When thoroughly understood, the principle 
may be illustrated by more difficult examples. " From 
simple to complex." The principle should be illus- 
trated not by one example only, but by numerous 
and varied ones, until it can be recognized in exam- 
ples widely different. 

Decimals should be taught by reference, not to 
common fractions, but to whole numbers. Whole 
numbers are written on the decimal scale. Reckon- 
ing from units we count to the left in whole numbers. 



220 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

tens, hundreds, thousands ; and in decimal fractions 
we count to the right, tenths, hundredths, thousandths ; 
for example, 222.222. Familiarity with the funda- 
mental rules in reckoning with whole numbers will 
render decimals very simple if taught as fractional 
parts of whole numbers written in the same scale, 
I and not as a strange way of writing common frac- 
tions. 

Compound numbers should be taught by the use 
of weights and measures. The child with a pint 
cup in hand should find by experiment that two 
pints make a quart, and four quarts a gallon. He 
should be accustomed to think of a quantity of 
liquid as so many gallons, quarts, or pints, according 
to his pleasure. 

In like manner a given distance should be thought 
of as so many inches, so many feet, so many rods, 
according to extent. A yard should always suggest 
not only an absolute length, but its equivalent, three 
feet, thirty-six inches. 

The cardinal principle here to be heeded is that 
the various modes of representing quantity are only 
matters of convenience. The same idea of quantity 
should be expressed in as many ways as the child is 
capable of using. 

A study of the history of weights and measures, 
together with comparison of them, is full of interest 
to the student capable of reflecting upon them. 

Processes should be taught before principles, and 
pupils should be led to deduce the principles for 
themselves and to formulate their own rules. Nothing 



METHOD OF TEACHING ARITHMETIC. 22 1 

in arithmetic should ever be taught as a matter of 
memory which can readily be learned as a matter 
of thinking. 

When students have advanced in the study of 
arithmetic to the limit of their powers of under- 
standing, they should either have more extended and 
dil^cult drill in the application of principles already 
understood, or they should drop the subject until 
they are mature enough to fully understand the new 
difBculties. 

TEACHING THE METRIC SYSTEM. 

There are certainly three reasons for teaching the 
metric system in our public schools. The terms used 
in it are so frequently met with in current literature 
and in conversation that ignorance of their meaning 
is very embarrassing. The practical use of the sys- 
tem in business life is sufficient to warrant every pro- 
spective business man, and especially every possible 
traveler, in acquiring a working knowledge of it. But 
the weightiest consideration of all lies in the system 
itself. It is so simple and complete that its study 
gives pleasure as well as valuable mental training to 
the student. 

The one indispensable condition for successfully 
teaching the system is a complete set of the usual 
weights and measures required in using the system 
— the meter, liter, and gram, their subdivisions and 
multiples. The pupil from the first should become 
familiar with these units by seeing, handling, and 
using them. He is not to learn about them, but 
to become familiar with them. 



22 2 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

1. Exhibit to the class a meter, and let them see 
it, handle it, and measure with it. When by actual 
use the necessity arises for using fractions of the 
meter, their attention may be called to the fact that 
the meter is divided into tenths, or ^ra'meter ; hun- 
dredths, or r^;^/2'meters ; and thousandths, or inilli- 
meters. Thus learned, these subdivisions will appear 
natural, simple, and be easily remembered. The 
multiples of the meter, dccaraoXox, //trimeter, kilo- 
meter, and wyr/rtmeter may then be taught. Copious 
exercises in reduction, ascending and descending, 
should be used until the pupils have thoroughly 
mastered all these terms, and grown familiar with 
the ideas of length represented by them. 

The meter should be taught independently, without 
any reference to the yard, foot, or inch. The pupil 
should be accustomed to think of extension in terms 
of the meter directly, and not indirectly, by the aid 
of the yard. 

2. Teach the meter in relation to the surface, and 
then to solids. 

3. The transition from measures of solids to meas- 
ures of capacity is very simple by showing the pupil 
that the cubic centimeter is a milliliter. He should 
actually see this by measuring the dimensions of the 
milliliters and observing that each is a centimeter, 
and then observing that it requires one thousand of 
these to make a cubic liter. The terms milliliter, 
centiliter, deciliter, should be illustrated, committed, 
and then rendered familiar by use. 

4. To teach the measures of weight it should be 



METHOD OF TEACHING ARITHMETIC. 223 

shown that the weight of a milliliter of water is a 
gram, and that the multiples and subdivisions of the 
gram are designated in the same way as those of the 
meter. Students should have practice in weighing 
articles, and designating their weight in terms of the 
gram. 

5. I do not think it well to introduce the idea of 
comparison with English weights and measures until 
after the entire metric system has been presented. 
The object should be to lead pupils to think in the 
metric system, and thus to acquire the same kind of 
knowledge of it that is acquired by a French boy or 
girl who knows no other system of weights and meas- 
ures. Thus when he meets the terms meter, kilo- 
gram, etc., he will at once recall the ideas that they 
represent without the delay and perplexity of first 
recalling the approximate English equivalent and then 
the idea represented by that. 

6. When the metric system as a whole has been 
presented, and its parts studied in their relations to 
each other, it may be compared with the English 
system, the meter with the yard, the liter with the 
quart, the kilo with the pound, the gram with the 
grain, etc. A very few equivalents may be committed 
to memory. 

7. By way of final review the pupils may be led to 
see the absolute necessity of weights and measures ; 
the need of a system, definite, fixed, simple ; the 
natural origin of the English system, with its com- 
plexity and inconsistencies ; the philosophical origin 
of the metric system, with its advantages and disad- 
vantages. 



2 24 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

TEACHING PERCENTAGE. 

The subject of percentage and its application to 
the processes of business, stocks, bonds, etc., is 
often quite perplexing to students. Many who 
enter the normal school are found to have very 
vague notions about it. One reason for this is that 
oftentimes students attempt the subject while too 
young to fully understand the reasoning involved in 
it. A certain maturity of mind, that usually comes 
only with age, is requisite for the mastery of the 
principles and processes of business. Another 
reason why girls especially find percentage and 
business arithmetic difficult is that they have very 
little practical knowledge of business. Very many 
of the terms are meaningless to them. It is not 
unusual to find young ladies who have never seen a 
check, draft, bill of exchange, letter of credit, insur- 
ance policy, or any of the ordinary foreign coins. 
A third reason for the obscurity of the subject is the 
faulty method of its presentation. Definitions and 
rules are first memorized, and the problems, classi- 
fied and arranged under the several cases, are worked 
by rule. 

There is perhaps no invariable method of present- 
ing the subject, and it is difficult to put upon paper 
the various devices and incidental aids which are so 
helpful in presenting it. Quite as much depends 
upon the teacher's manner as upon his method. 
The following outline of a method may be found 
suggestive, especially to those inexperienced teachers 
who have no well-defined method of their own. 



METHOD OF TEACHING ARITHMETIC. 225 

I. A meter affords a very simple means of 
introducing the subject. Let the pupils observe 
that it is divided into one hundred equal parts. The 
whole equals \%%. The half contains ^^, one quar- 
ter equals iV(y> one tenth equals -fVu' etc. An ordi- 
nary foot rule, such as carpenters carry in their 
pockets, answers an admirable purpose. Numerous 
problems can be presented to the eye by aid of the 
rule ; for example, If from the whole, \%%, I take 
■^ (I), what remains t Answer, -^-ii^, or |. A line 
or a square drawn upon the blackboard is helpful. 
A hundred grains of corn or beans afford amuse- 
ment and are useful in giving concreteness to a 
subject often taught too abstractly. 

2. Numerous simple problems can be based on the 
above facts, such as 3^ -f t¥o = ? iVV — 1 w = ? 
■^^ X 2 = .? iVo -^ 3 = ? These should at first be 
solved by observation, not memory. The pupils 
should be led to question each other until they 
become very expert in both question and answer. 

3. The teacher may now explain that instead of 
saying one hundred hundredths, fifty hundredths, 
etc., we may say one hundred per cent., fifty per 
cent., etc. We may write it in full as above, or in 
form of a fraction \%%, x^A ; we may indicate it 
100%, 50%. Pupils should be drilled in writing 
and reading expressions of percentage. 

4. They should then be led to make for themselves 
a table of equivalents from i to x^o 

I = 100%. I = 25%. 



2 26 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

They should be rendered familiar with this table by- 
use. The most common equivalents should be com- 
mitted to memory, and so associated in mind that \ 
will suggest immediately I2i%, etc., \ = 20%, etc., 
and vice versa. Very great stress is laid upon this, 
for entire familiarity with these equivalents and skill 
in their use will greatly facilitate the progress of the 
pupil. Various problems, at first very simple, can 
be given and required of the pupils, such as : A 
farmer put one half of his sheep in one pasture, and 
75, the remainder, in another. How many had he } 
If he put 10% of his cattle in one pen, 15% in 
another, 25% in a third, and the remainder, 100, in 
a fourth, how many had he.'' If 8% of his potato 
crop was 80 bushels, what was his crop.? If 20% of 
a pole was below ground, and sixty feet above, what 
was its length .•* These problems should be increas- 
ingly difficult ; should deal with concrete rather than 
with abstract numbers ; should relate to other things 
than money, to avoid the misconception so common 
that percentage has only or chiefly to do with inter- 
est or other money transactions. 

5. Pupils may now be led to the careful analysis, 
by inspection, of a question such as : What is six 
per cent, of eight hundred 1 One per cent, of eight 
hundred is 8. Six per cent. =6 X 8 = 48. Drill 
on meaning and use of terms, "base," "rate," "per- 
centage." What per cent, of 800 is 48 } If 48 is 
6% what is i % .■' Of what number is 48 six per 
cent. 1 etc. 

6. Familiarity with this one example will reveal 



METHOD OF TEACHING ARITHMETIC. 22/ 

the relation of "base," "rate," and "percentage." 
Pupils can then be led to propound to each other 
numerous problems of a similar nature. When 
familiarity has been acquired with the facts, then, 
and not till then, 

7. The formulas may be introduced. Call atten- 
tion to the meaning of the word percentage —" a 
given number of hundredths of a number" or 
quantity. Percentage is equal to the base multi- 
plied by the rate. Abbreviated, p = b r. Let this 
be explained, illustrated, rendered familiar by refer- 
ence to example already studied. 
p (48) = b (800) X r (.06). b = p ^ r. r = p ^ b. 

Pupils are not to commit the formulas to memory, 
but to recognize them as short ways of expressing 
the . facts with which they have become well 
acquainted. If they know the meaning of the 
terms base, rate, percentage, amount, difference, 
and can give a clear definition of them, they can 
write the formulas. A very little drill will enable 
them to derive all other formulas from the funda- 
mental ones, 

p = br. A=b-fp;(b-fbr),and(iH-r)b. D=b — p. 
It may not always be wise to introduce the formulas 
when the pupil is passing through the subject for the 
first time. They may be deferred to a later period 
when the subject is reviewed. This will depend 
upon the maturity of the class, or the ability 
shown. 

8. A large number of problems should now be 

used for drill. 



2 28 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

(i) Many of these should be given by pupils 
themselves. 

(2) When called upon to solve a problem the 
student should {a) read it ; {b) state what elements 
are given ; if) what is required ; {d) analyze the 
problem ; {c) give the appropriate formula ; (/) 
perform the work, and {g) make the explanation, 
giving a reason for each step. 

The pernicious habit of committing to memory 
definitions and rules, and " doing the sums according 
to the rule," tends to stupefy the reason, while the 
habit of analyzing the work done, giving a reason 
for every step, arriving at principles through 
processes, framing his own rules, and devising 
his own illustrative examples and problems, 
awakens the whole mind, stimulates observation, 
quickens the memory, develops the reason, and 
cultivates language. 

9. When the students have mastered the subject 
of percentage they may be introduced to its various 
applications, beginning with profit and loss, or com- 
mission. The all-important point to be observed is 
the essential iniity of all the processes in the vari- 
ous topics of business arithmetic. "Stocks" and 
"bonds" are only forms of percentage. If the 
students know percentage, and are able to recognize 
the elements base, rate, percentage under their 
various disguises and new names, their work will be 
easy and enjoyable. I have been told repeatedly by 
intelligent students that it had never occurred to 
them that stocks had any relation to percentage ; 



METHOD OF TEACHING ARITHMETIC. 



229 



the subject had been introduced and taught as an 
entirely new one. Having finished percentage 
they took up another subject, " stocks," which was 
treated independently as though it had no connec- 
tion with percentage. Instead of this it should, of 
course, be taught as percentage applied to buying 
and selling stocks. When students clearly apprehend 
the great truth that the general principles of per- 
centage lie at the base of all the subjects of 
business arithmetic, including bank discount and 
foreign exchange, and that it is only necessary to 
note the peculiar features in the application of 
these principles, the whole subject takes on a new- 
aspect. 

10. It is very helpful to students who are 
unacquainted with business to see and handle 
notes, checks, drafts, letters of credit, bills of 
exchange, and coins of different countries, while 
they are studying the subjects in which these are 
involved. 

Ordinarily teachers can by a little trouble provide 
themselves with these, and thus greatly abridge their 
labor, arouse interest, and impart definite knowledge 
on these obscure topics. 

I may summarize the general principles involved 
in this method as follows : — 

1. Percentage is to be based on common fractions. 

2. It is to be taught inductively and not 
deductively. 

3. It is to be taught so far as possible concretely 
and not abstractly. Facts precede principles. 



230 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

4. The method is synthetic rather than analytic. 
Reviews should be analytic. 

5. The method appeals to the understanding 
rather than to the memory. Memory conserves 
what the understanding grasps. 

6. The pupil is led to see, to feel, to invent, to 
prove. He makes his own rules. 

7. Each step prepares the way for what follows, 
or is based on what precedes. 

8. One difficulty is presented at a time. 

9. The various topics of business arithmetic are 
taught as applications of percentage, and constant 
reference is made to fundamental principles. 

10. Each new subject is studied by comparison 
with what has gone before. In stocks " par value " 
corresponds to "base" in percentage, to "principal" 
in interest, etc. 

Taught in this way percentage may be brought 
within the range of grammar school pupils, be made 
interesting to girls, and be, in a high degree, a gym- 
nastic for the mind, and practical in life. 

TEACHING SQUARE ROOT. 

It is not unusual for students in arithmetic, when 
they come to square root, to be required to learn the 
rule, and then to work the problems by that. No 
effort is made to explain the process or to give any 
reasons whatever for any of the various steps. The 
minds of the students are thus left not only in dark- 
ness, but in perplexity, and oftentimes in positive 
distress. The subject thus taught not only does not 



METHOD OF TEACHING ARITHMETIC. 



231 



aid in training the mind to think, but it even hinders 
it in its growth and does it a positive injury. That 
this evil is very common is shown by the testimony 
of numbers of students who come to the normal 
school. 

Square root may be taught so as to be perfectly 
plain to pupils of twelve years of age, and so as to 
be helpful to them in grasping mathematical truth, 
besides becoming a source of even much intellectual 
pleasure. The following is suggested as a brief out- 
line of one method of doing this : — 

1. The idea of a square should be awakened by 
a figure drawn upon the board. Pupils should be 
required to describe the square, and to draw squares 
of various sizes. They should be led to notice that 
a figure one inch, one foot, etc., square contains one 
square inch, one square foot, etc. A figure two 
inches square contains four square inches ; three 
inches square, nine square inches, etc. They will 
be interested in noticing the law of increase. The 
square of i is i, of 2 is 4, or three more than the 
first ; of 3 is 9, or 5 more than the second ; of 4 is 
16, or 7 more than the third. Thus the squares of 
consecutive numbers increase in the order, 3, 5, 7, 9, 
II, 13, etc. Each successive increment is increased 
by 2. 

2. They should be led to see that the surface of 
a rectilineal figure, not a square, is represented by 
the product of the length by the width. Thus the 
area of a figure five inches long by three inches wide 
is 5X3- 



232 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

3. Let them observe that if they wish to increase 
the size of a figure, say five inches square, so that it 
shall be say seven inches square, they must add a 
narrow strip 5X2 to one side, then a similar strip to 
a second side, and lastly complete the figure by add- 
ing a little square 2X2. They will thus see that the 
larger square 7^ is made up of three parts : 5^, two 
rectangles 2X5, and 2^. Let them build up many 
such squares until this simple truth becomes familiar 
to them. 

4. Show that " squaring " a number is only another 
name for multiplying a number by itself, of which 
they have had numerous examples in the multiplica- 
tion table: 2x2, 3X3, 12X 12, etc. Let them con- 
struct for themselves a table of the squares of num- 
bers from I to 100: — 



1-= I 


10-=: 100 


g^= 81 


2^= 4 


2Cp- = 400 


992 = 980 1 


3^^= 9 


30^= 900 


ioo2= 1 0000 


5^=25 


502^ 2500 





This work can be greatly shortened by observing 
the law of increase stated under i. Thus, if to 100, 
the square of 10, we add 21, we have 121, the square 
of 1 1. To this we must add 23 to get the square of 
12 — 144; and to this 25, to obtain 169, the square 
of 13, etc. 

5. Explain what is meant by the " square root " of 
a number — " one of two equal factors of that num- 
ber ; " "a second number which multiplied by itself 
will produce the first ; " that it is represented by the 



METHOD OF TEACHING ARITHMETIC. 233 

length of one side of the square figure that repre- 
sents the number. Explain that "finding the square 
root " of a number is finding that equal factor, or that 
one side. 

6. The pupils should now be drilled on the table, 
(i) Such questions as, What is the square of 4.? 

What is the square root of \6} The square of 9.? 
The square root of 81 .-' The square of 25 .? The 
square root of 625 .'' etc., should render them very 
familiar with the table without requiring them to 
memorize it. 

(2) They should be led to observe the " perfect 
squares " in the table ; that there are no other per- 
fect squares — none, for example, between 144 and 
169; that as the square root of 144 is 12, and the 
square root of 169 is 13, there can be no square root 
of 150, which is a whole number, for there is no whole 
number between 12 and 13. 

(3) They should be drilled in finding from the table 
the square roots of all perfect squares between i and 
10,000 ; then of finding the square root, to within one, 
of all other numbers below 10,000. 

The practice of finding by inspection the approxi- 
mate square root of numbers is very important. It 
greatly simplifies the subject ; it often serves all prac- 
tical purposes without going further. This may be 
taught to pupils when making a final review of multi- 
plication and division. 

7. They may now be led to observe from the table 
that the square of units cannot contain more than 
two figures, since the square of 9, the largest unit, 



234 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

is only 8i ; consequently the square root of any per- 
fect square which is less than loo must be units. In 
the same way lead them to see by examining the 
table that the square of tens gives hundreds or 
thousands, and in no case can the square of tens 
(99) exceed four places (9,801) ; hence the square root 
of any number consisting of three or four places will 
be composed of two figures, tens and units. 

8. They may now be drilled in finding the square 
root of easy numbers (perfect squares and small num- 
bers whose root is known) by construction. For 
example, the square root of 625 must consist of 
two figures (625) ; the left-hand figure of the root 
cannot exceed two tens, or twenty. Its square must 
be 400. But 400 does not exhaust the 625, and the 
square must be made larger. This can only be done 
by adding to it successively two rectangles 20 X 5, and 
a square 5X5. This will use up all the number, and 
625 will be found to be the surface of a square whose 
side is 20 -f- 5, or 25. 

Let these problems be repeated until the process 

of construction becomes familiar. The pupil \^\SS.fecl 

the necessity for each step, can be led to tell what 

he does and why, and is thus able to enunciate a rule 

35 for extracting the square root. 

^^ 9. Students who are unacquainted with 

-|JT algebra may be led to see that when 25 is 
j -J ^ squared — multiplied by itself — the product 

4 625 consists of four hundred, the square of 

635 the tens ; two hundred, twice the product 
of the tens by the units ; and twenty-five, the square 
of the units. 



METHOD OF TEACHING ARITHMETIC. 235 

In extracting the square root of 625, when he has 
taken away 400, the square of the tens (20), there 
will be a remainder, 225, made up of two times the 
tens, or forty, multiplied by the units, and of the 
square of the units. That is, the remainder, 225, 
is made up of two parts, — the square of the units 
figure, which we may ignore for a time, and another 
number which is a product of two numbers, one of 
which is given, namely, twice the tens, — and that 
consequently if we divide 225 by 40 we shall probably 
ascertain what the other factor, the unit figure of the 
root, is. The quotient is 5. Testing the result, we 
find that 225 consists of two times the tens, 40, by 
the units (5), or 200, plus 25, the square of the units ; 
hence the figure 5 is correct, and the true root is 25. 
In the same way build up the square of 45, 6^, 82, 
etc., and then proceed to find by construction the 
roots of the squares thus formed. 

More advanced students can be taught the formula, 
(a -|- b)^ ■=z2c' -\- 2ab -\- b^, or factoring, = a^ -|- (2a -|- 
b) b. 

The mystery of " doubling the root already found 
for a trial divisor " is made clear by showing that 
every remainder, after taking away the square of the 
tens (a^), is made up of two factors (2a -J- b) and b ; 
that is, twice the tens plus the units, and the units. 
One of these factors is approximately known because 
the larger part (2a), twice the tens, is known. The 
other can be found approximately by dividing the 
entire remainder by the two tens. The square root 
is simply evolving what has been involved. If the 



236 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

pupils can see how squares are made they can under- 
stand how they are unmade. 

10. At this point a very little pains will suffice to 
explain the method of extracting the square root of 
decimals and of common fractions. 

11. When they have become familiar with the 
foregoing they should be instructed in the properties 
of the right-angled triangle, with the meaning of the 
terms " base," " altitude," and " hypothenuse," and 
the relation to each other of the squares described 
thereon. Then various problems can be given, or 
better, required, involving the use of these facts. 
In the earlier stages of the work diagrams should 
be required, illustrative of the method of solution of 
each problem. 

This method of teaching the square root rests upon 
a few simple principles : — 

1. The subject of evolution should be presented as 
the counterpart of involution. First make the square, 
and then unmake it. Show its relation to the familiar 
processes of multiplication and of factoring. 

2. Every step in the work should be made evident 
to the eye. Use diagrams freely. Nothing should 
be memorized. 

3. Only one difficulty should be presented at a 
time. 

4. Each advancing step should be made very 
familiar to the pupil by copious drill exercises. 

5. Lead him to do his own work as far as possible, 
make his own tables, construct his own squares, ex- 
plain his own processes, and deduce his own rule. 



METHOD OF TEACHING ARITHMETIC. 237 

Original problems involving square root are much 
more valuable to the student than any found in 
books or made by his teacher. Everything should 
be thought out. 

6. When the process has been thoroughly mastered 
and described in the pupil's own language then the 
rule of the book may be learned and repeated until 
it becomes familiar. 



XVII. 
EXAMINATIONS. 



It cannot be too often insisted on that examination is a good 
educational servant, but a bad master. 

" A Protest," The Nineteenth Century, N^ovember, 1888. 

Ex.\MiNATiONS in our schools cannot cease. They are a compo- 
nent part of the school. They should be reasonable. When all are 
so the better part of the profession will have no cause to condemn. 

Aaron Gove. 



What an eye-opener a searching written examination would be 

in schools where teachers talk and explain much and the pupils recite 

very little; where the instruction is given largely in the form of 

running talks without a halt to test results ! 

E. E. White. 



I BELIEVE an examination should seek for outlines of thought, 
fundamental principles, general laws, comprehensive summaries, and 
not for detached facts, minute details, or special items of knowledge. 

H. S. Tarbell. 



XVII. 
EXAMINATIONS. 

Examinations wisely conducted are a process of teaching as well as 
of testing. — George A. Littlefield. 

The subject of school examinations is much 
mooted, and the most extreme views are expressed 
regarding them. Like every other educational 
device they are good or evil according as they 
are used judiciously or without discretion. By 
examinations is here meant written exercises pro- 
duced to answer sets of questions proposed in 
writing by the examiner. These exercises serve 
many useful purposes, some of which are here 
named. 

I. They may serve as a stimulus or incentive to 
study. Students who know that at some period of 
their course they will be required to give written 
answers to questions based on the work done are 
likely to be more attentive, industrious, and inter- 
ested in it. 

There is constant need of some motive to keep 
the mind active and attentive. There are many 
distractions; every student is liable to lose interest 
in study, especially if it has no special inherent 
attraction for him. Constant appeal to the highest 
motives should be made, and all proper effort put 

241 



242 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

forth to render the study attractive for its own sake. 
The incentive of the approaching examination should 
be used sparingly ; indeed, not at all, perhaps, unless 
it is needed ; but when it is needed, it is one of the 
legitimate agents at the schoolmaster's command. 

2. They encourage thoroughness. Those who 
prepare for an oral recitation may depend upon 
chance or artifice or favoritism to help them 
through ; but a searching examination calling for 
exact written statements is another matter, and 
demands better preparation. It is easier for most 
young persons to talk than it is for them to write. 
Less preparation is required for them to make a 
passable recitation than to write a paper, so that if 
a paper is never demanded they are likely to do only 
so much work as will enable them to meet the 
requirements of an oral recitation. 

Besides, what is spoken is fleeting, what is written 
is permanent. What is spoken cannot so readily be 
dissected, analyzed, and criticized. But when the 
teacher has before him the written statement he 
can subject it to the most rigid criticism, and the 
fact that this can, and probably will, be done leads 
the pupil to devote more care to the thorough 
mastery of the subject. 

3. They afford an opportunity, in some instances, 
for a review of the whole subject passed over during 
the term. The lessons from day to day are liable to 
be fragmentary, disassociated from the general topic. 
This is not a fault but rather a virtue. When 
examining a particular gem one does not wish to be 



EXAM IN A TIONS 243 

obliged to hold before the mind the whole science 
of mineralogy. Every lesson, however, has its rela- 
tions to a general topic. Science is essentially the 
knowledge of subjects in their relations and inter- 
dependencies. Examinations may provoke to such a 
review as will bring the whole before the mind in 
such a way as to call into clear light the logical 
relations of its several parts. If this review scans 
the subject as a whole, and fuses it in the mind so 
that it is held, as it were, in solution, there is great 
gain. The review should be not merely a roll-call 
for facts, but a thought exercise in quest of logical 
mastery of the subject. 

4. They are often valuable as an exercise in 
English composition, requiring as they do clear, 
concise, comprehensive statements. One of the 
great ends to be obtained by study is power of 
expression. One needs not only to know, but to 
be able to express what he knows. It is not enough 
to be able to express it in oral speech, but it is 
important to know how to express it in written 
language also. Literature is a valuable result of 
education. The practice of giving in a few pages 
of terse, good English the result of one's study for 
months of a particular branch of learning is an 
admirable preparation for authorship. 

5. They are revelations to the pupils of their own 
ability and attainments, as well as of their weakness 
and defects. One great aim of education is to 
objectify the student's mind so that he may look 
upon himself, "see himself as others see him," in 



244 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

order that he may have a just estimate of himself. 
When he has pored over a textbook for a few weeks, 
recited from it, listened to recitations by his class- 
mates, and explanations by his teacher, he may easily 
be deceived as to the real extent of his knowledge. 
An examination that requires him to state in writing 
just what he actually knows often serves to undeceive 
him. Conscious ignorance not only takes away 
conceit, but is frequently the very beginning of 
knowledge. 

6. They call for concentration of mind, sustained 
mental effort, and a ready use of one's resources, 
which is a valuable educational discipline. In the 
class students may depend upon each other and may 
lean heavily upon the teacher. In the examinations 
they must depend upon themselves. Whatever of 
intellectual energy is put forth must be self-evolved. 
It cannot be called forth by others : it is the 
student's own act. 

A recitation is short, and in a large class makes 
comparatively little demand upon any one individual. 
In an examination a demand may be made for as 
long a continuous concentration of mind as the 
student is capable of. When not too prolonged and 
severe, these examinations are periods of mental 
growth. Many students at such times become 
conscious of a degree of mental power of which 
they did not know themselves to be possessed. 
They rise to a higher plane of intellectual activity, 
and look back to successive examinations as a 
traveler looks back to the successive heights he 
has climbed in reaching the summit of his ambition. 



EXAMINATIONS. ^ 245 

7. They reveal to the teacher the results of his 
teaching, the failure or success of his methods, and 
thus afford an opportunity of modifying his work 
when necessary. Teachers are prone to mistake 
the attentive listening of the student for a real 
appropriation of his teaching. The steady eye does 
not always betoken an understanding mind. 

The test of good teaching is the independent 
mental activity awakened in the mind of the pupil. 
Whether this exists or not cannot always be known 
from oral recitation. The presence of the teacher 
and the stimulus of his eye and voice may arouse an 
energy that wanes when he is absent. He looks for 
permanent results. The written examination paper 
that is the sole product of the student's thought is a 
revealer of how far the teacher's efforts to awaken 
permanent intellectual activity and to impart real 
knowledge have been successful. 

8. The tabulated results of a series of examinations, 
extending through several months or years, indicate 
with considerable certainty the student's trend of 
mind, habits of study, and scholarly development. 
These results are especially valuable to parents in 
deciding what is best for their children. 

It is desirable that the education of a child should 
be many-sided. All his powers should be called into 
action and should be symmetrically developed. The 
tendency is for the pupil to have a liking for a 
certain class of studies, as for mathematics, or 
natural science, or language, and to pursue these 
to the neglect of other branches of learning, and 



246 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY, 

thus fail to secure both general culture and liberal 
knowledge. This trend of mind is nowhere more 
distinctly shown than in the results of examinations. 
They sometimes reveal such unexpected power in 
some certain direction as to warrant an early special- 
ization of study. 

9. The results are helpful to superintendents and 
others in forming an opinion of the progress of the 
pupils and the work of the teacher. There is need 
of supervision of the work done where many teachers 
are employed in the same or similar schools. Espe- 
cially is it needful to have an eye on the work of 
those who are young and inexperienced. Personal 
visits on the part of the superintendent are valuable 
in certain directions, but the written questions pre- 
pared as a test of the work done, and the character 
of the papers submitted in answer, are invaluable as 
indicating the nature of the work accomplished by 
the teachers. 

As one element in determining the fitness of 
pupils for promotion they perform an office that 
cannot be performed by any other agency. 

10. They give to school work a kind of dignity, 
increase the student's self-respect, and impart to the 
teacher's mind a judicial habit, freeing him from the 
great tendency to judge of his pupils by sentimental 
regard rather than by critical judgment. 

Study is work and not play. School life has a 
serious side to it ; it is a preparation for the conflicts 
and struggles that are inevitable when schooldays 
are over. Every exercise should be so conducted as 



EXAMINA TIONS. 247 

to contribute to the final end of developing a sturdy, 
honest, independent manhood. The pupil should be 
tauo-ht that he must stand alone and be judged 
on "the merits of his work. Written examinations 
develop this spirit. 

It is hard for favoritism or for a too generous pity 
to break through the restraints of examination papers 
and to give to one unmerited credit and withhold 
from others rewards honestly earned. 

With these ends in view, how shall the examina- 
tions be conducted ? 

I They should be an ordinary, and not an extra- 
ordinary, part of school machinery. If they are held 
only at the close of a term or at the conclusion of a 
study, the students should be prepared for them by 
the character of the daily recitation, and by occasional 
written recitations, and "tests," which resemble the 
written examinations, but are less severe. 

Pupils who are trained to express their thoughts 
in writing acquire great facility in doing so and lose 
nearly all their dread and anxiety on the approach of 
an examination. 

The great labor incident in making out sets of 
questions and looking over a large number of papers 
may be abridged by training the pupils to share the 
work with the teacher. 

2 The purpose and method of the examination 
should be fully explained to the pupils and their 
mistakes and failures should be pointed out. 

The antipathy which many of them have to exami- 
nations arises frequently from a misunderstanding of 



248 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

their purpose. They often regard them apparently 
as traps and pitfalls set to catch the unwary. 
Sometimes they complain of them as unfair. This 
can be prevented by — fairness, and a full exposition 
of the principles followed in marking. 

3. The questions should be adapted to the age and 
ability of the pupils, easy enough to encourage them 
to attempt all, and difficult enough to call for their 
best efforts : should pertain to the work actually 
done : should be explicit, concise, logical, requiring 
thought and a mastery of principles as well as 
memory. 

It is no small art to question correctly. There is 
no surer test of the teacher's power than this. There 
is no greater qualification for successful teaching than 
the ability to question well. Great attention should 
be paid to the acquisition of this power. 

Advanced pupils, particularly normal students, 
should be carefully trained in framing questions, 
singly and in sets. There is no better review of a 
subject than is involved in making out a series of 
questions covering it. 

4. Too much importance should not be attached 
to the results. They should be reckoned as only 
one element, among several, in determining the 
standing of the student and his fitness for pro- 
motion or graduation. They should never be made 
the basis of ranking or the sole ground of promotion. 

There are some elements of intellectual and moral 

growth that perhaps cannot be tested by questions. 

A written examination at best is an imperfect test 



EXAMINATIONS. 249 

even of knowledge. It should not be allowed to 
usurp too large a place in the routine of school life. 
This it may easily do, and often does. 

5. Examinations should always be regarded as 
simply one means or device in the process of edu- 
cation and should never be treated as if they were 
the goal to be gained. They are a means, and not 
an end. 

The daily recitations are chiefly to be relied on in 
determining the pupil's work, and should take 
precedence over the examinations in determining 
progress and fitness for promotion. We should 
not lose sight of the fact that the chief value of 
the examination is its reflex influence on the daily 
recitations. 

6, They should not be so severe or prolonged as 
to overtax the student's powers, should be conducted 
with absolute fairness and impartiality, as well as 
with good sense in regard to time, place, and condi- 
tions ; and proper allowance should be made for any 
exceptional circumstances, such as illness on the 
part of the student. The "final" examination 
should be held long enough before the close of 
the term to allow the teacher to make the proper 
use of the results before the class separates. 

The outcry lately raised in England against 
competitive examinations, which has voiced itself 
in the imposing "Protest" published in The Nine- 
teenth Century for November, 1888, is not pertinent 
when applied to examinations as school exercises. 
The evils complained of in that famous paper are 



250 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

due in part to the incidental abuse of examinations, 
and in part, as is shown in the reply published in The 
Nineteenth Century for December, 1888, to the state 
of the civil service and the condition of society in 
England. Teachers should not be frightened into 
the abandonment of a faithful and indispensable 
servant on the first whisper of evil against his good 
name. 



XVIII. 
. THE IDEAL SCHOOLMASTER. 



God mouldeth some for a schoolmaster's life. 

Thomas Fuller. 



The brightest minds of Athenian philosophy were the instructors 

of the Athenian youth. 

John Lalor. 



O'er wayward childhood would'st thou hold firm rule, 
And sun thee in the light of happy faces, 
Love, Hope, and Patience, these must be thy graces, 
And in thine own heart let them first keep school. 

S. T, Coleridge. 

Full well they laughed with counterfeited glee 
At all his jokes, for many a joke had he. 

Oliver Goldsmith. 

He must pour out upon them the results of his reading, his 

thought and experience, with unsparing prodigality, forgetful of himself 

and his own reputation; even willing, like a true mother, to give up 

his own mental being if he can only see the life of other souls 

springing into power under his hand. 

Martin B. Anderson. 



XVIII. 
THE IDEAL SCHOOLMASTER. 

Although we may never be able fully to realize our ideal, yet woe be 
to us if we have no ideal to realize. — Archibshop Whately. 

Crowning the Acropolis at Athens stand the 
ruins of what was once the most beautiful temple 
in the world. Faultless in its proportions, wellnigh 
perfect in the execution of its details, of the purest 
white marble, and adorned with sculpture of the 
most exquisite workmanship, it was the glory of 
Athens, the pride of Greece, and a wonder of the 
world. Even in its ruins the Parthenon draws to 
itself with magnetic power the hearts of all lovers 
of the beautiful. 

For centuries in many countries the human mind 
had wrought at an ideal of the beautiful in the form 
of a temple. At last the ideal was reached ; it has 
never been surpassed. The Parthenon did not indeed 
fully embody that ideal. The ideal never becomes 
real. The mind may seize it, but the hands never. 
As an ethereal vision it may be faultless, but as an 
embodied reality, wrought in gross materials by 
human workmanship, it will reveal many a flaw and 
defect. Nevertheless as an ideal, what power it had 
over men's minds ! What resources, what skill, what 
energy, what sacrifice, what patient waiting did it 



254 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

evoke, until at last men saw, admired, and loved it 
as "a thing of beauty, and a joy forever." What 
sovereignty that ideal has had over men's minds ! 
In every age and in every country artists have bor- 
rowed from the Parthenon, and have attempted 
countless times, in whole or in part, to reproduce 
this matchless building. Even those who have bent 
their energies to develop a style of architecture 
wholly different — Byzantine, Roman, or Gothic — 
have felt the strange spell of this ideal urging 
them to their utmost endeavor, that what they pro- 
duced should be as perfect of its kind as that 
ideal of the Greek temple, which lent such grace 
and beauty to the shrine of the virgin goddess. 

It is ever thus with ideals. Seemingly baseless as 
the fabric of a vision, they are the most indestruc- 
tible of human creations. An ideal once formed 
never perishes from the earth. It belongs to the 
empire of truth, whose subjects are immortal. 

It may not be unprofitable for us here to con- 
sider for a little while — even though the picture be 
drawn only in outline, and that by an unpractised 
and unskilful hand — the ideal of a schoolmaster. 

We are the representatives of three hundred 
thousand American schoolmasters, in whose hands 
are placed very largely the destinies of ten millions 
of school children. What manner of teachers should 
we be t What is our aim .-' Toward what are we 
striving ? 

It is perhaps needless to say that the term school- 
master is used as including all of those who devote 



THE IDEAL SCHOOLMASTER. 255 

themselves to teaching. It is not restricted to any 
one class or grade or sex. In this day, when so 
many teachers are women, any discussion of teach- 
ing which did not apply to them and their noble 
work would be fatally defective. 

It may also be well to add that the effort in this 
paper is to present the spirit of teaching, the tout 
ensemble of pedagogical virtues, rather than to 
sketch the portrait of any single individual. Should 
any of us measure ourselves by a perfect standard, 
we might well be abashed, but when we look upon 
our associates and realize that we are members of a 
great and noble brotherhood of earnest and true 
workers, who, taken together, represent all that 
can be claimed for the teacher, we may well " take 
courage," and strive, each in his own sphere and 
according to the ijieasure of his ability and of his 
opportunities, to share in this ideal spirit, and to 
contribute something to the sum total of teaching 
power. 

No artist, however humble, if he did but have the 
spirit of the artist, ever stood in the presence of the 
Parthenon without feeling his soul quickened and 
his aspirations ennobled. Even a picture of the 
temple in ruins stirs men's souls. If the sketch of 
the ideal schoolmaster which I now hold before you 
is true to nature, it may be helpful to some at least, 
and harmful to none. 

What now is our ideal of the teacher ? 

The ideal schoolmaster is a manly man, one who 
has lofty conceptions of human life and duty, gen- 



256 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

erous sympathies, keen discernment of life's realities, 
and who fully appreciates its responsibilities and 
privileges. 

Conscious of ability of a high order, of refined 
tastes, of large possibilities of achievement and en- 
joyment, he will find in his work of teaching ample 
scope for all his powers and attainments. As one 
who is to shape human destinies and mold human 
lives quite as much by what he is as by what he 
does, he is guided in all his actions by manly prin- 
ciples. Keen and accurate in his observation of 
facts, deliberate in his conclusions, wise in his enact- 
ments, judicial in his decisions, just in his adminis- 
tration, inflexible in his adherence to right, consistent 
in all things, full of kindliness and helpfulness in 
discipline, patient with dullness and tender of the 
weak and unfortunate, always making new acquisi- 
tions for himself, and not only earnestly interested 
in the welfare of each member of his little kingdom, 
but an active, intelligent, useful member of the 
community in which he resides, he is a man to be 
admired for his true manliness. Teaching has its 
boundaries and imposes restrictions a little irksome 
at times, but this is true of every human calling. It 
is incident to life. The soul of man, because it is a 
soul, feels deeply the limitations of matter. This is 
prophetic of a realm of pure spirit. But the ideal 
schoolmaster finds in his field of labor fullest oppor- 
tunity for the exercise of the greatest and noblest 
qualities of manhood. He has entered a profession 
where the possibilities of labor are boundless, where 



THE IDEAL SCHOOLMASTER. 



257 



new fields of thought and knowledge are ever pre- 
senting themselves, where there are opportunities of 
seeing reproduced in other lives all that is noblest 
and best in his own. 

Teaching is a profession so honorable that it 
confers dignity upon all who enter it worthily, and 
borrows dignity from none. No man ever yet was 
so great that he might not have found in teaching 
exigencies for which his greatness would not sufifice. 

The ideal schoolmaster blends in himself such ele- 
ments of body and mind and heart that all, not only 
those who from their inferior position may even look 
up to him as a superior being, but all who have 
relations with him, whether personal or official, busi- 
ness, social, or professional, will unite in saying. 
This is a man. Not a transcendental being, in the 
world' but not of it, but a man of the people, a 
veritable product of his age, a typical representative 
of the best results of the civilization of his time. 
Dwarfed he may be by his environment, but he is 
all the more truly manly by this. The superhuman 
only can rise above human infirmities. Even Jesus, 
that he might become the great Teacher of our race, 
emptied himself and became a man. 

The ideal schoolmaster is not a recluse, not a 
pillar saint, not a hermit, not a morose man, nor one 
solemnly weighed down by either a sense of his own 
dignity or of the grave responsibilities of his office, 
but a man living among men, practical, full of com- 
monsense, tact, and worldly wisdom. He is all the 
better for a little rough experience in "boarding 



258 STUDIES IN PEDA GOGY. 

round," that he may see himself as others see him, 
and — others as they are. A man of energy, force 
of character, of good business habits, promptness, 
decision, regularity, and fidelity, having a just regard 
for himself, his good name, his personal habits and 
appearance, respectful of the rights of others, con- 
siderate of their feelings, polite in manner, gentle in 
speech, he is positive without rudeness, independent 
without asperity, refined without being effeminate, 
and elegant without losing his simplicity. 

The highest type of manliness does not exclude a 
keen relish for humor. The young are full of frolic 
and play ; they like a joke, enjoy a laugh, and are won 
by a smile. Sunshine is more effective in germinat- 
ing plants, developing flowers, and maturing fruit, 
than darkness. Potato vines do, to be sure, grow in 
a cellar, but they are pale and sickly. Frost has its 
uses, and doubtless the world has need of icebergs, or 
the North would not produce them so abundantly. 
But we should have a dreary climate were it not for 
the south wind and the Gulf Stream. 

The ideal schoolmaster is a philanthropist, one who 
loves man as man, one who recognizes the inherent 
dignity of the human soul, one who grasps the basal 
unity of all, of whatever race, condition, or sex ; who 
accepts practically the one supreme fact that every 
being who bears God's image has in germ the possi- 
bilities'^of all human excellence and attainments, and 
is entitled to the fullest development possible of all 
his powers. That which marred the noble ideal of 
education formulated by Plato and Aristotle was the 



THE IDEAL SCHOOLMASTER. 259 

fact that it was limited to the few, while the many- 
were debarred from participating in its advantages. 
The ideal schoolmaster asks for talent, or rather 
teachableness, wherever it may be found. He finds 
it among slaves as among freeborn, in the hovel as 
in the palace, among the outcasts of society even as 
among the rich, the titled, and the proud. To be 
well born is indeed a boon, but who can be better 
born than he who has God for a father .'' No pessi- 
mist bemoaning the remediless degradation of the 
race, no dyspeptic deeming all men fools but him- 
self, no aristocrat wondering what common people 
could ever have been made for, no educational dude 
prating of culture of which the masses are incapable 
— none of these can be an ideal schoolmaster. Only 
he who has an unconquerable faith in human nature, 
in the pedagogic salvability of the race, who has an 
enthusiasm for young people, and an ardent zeal for 
the unfortunate, the lowly, the poor, and the igno- 
rant, who with a beneficence wellnigh divine would 
scatter the blessings of learning freely among all 
classes — including negroes, Indians, Chinese — typi- 
fies the spirit of the age as embodied in the ideal 
schoolmaster. 

His broad philanthropy, which embraces in its 
generous scope every individual of the race, kindles 
to a white heat in the schoolroom, and, losing its 
generic character, takes the form of an intense per- 
sonal interest in the welfare and progress of every 
child committed to his care. He stands heartily as 
well as officially in loco parentis. 



260 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

It goes without saying that the ideal schoolmaster 
is a patriot. As a student of history he recognizes 
the almost omnipotent power of the State over 
human destiny. It is true, in a sense, that the 
State, with its constitution, its statutes, its institu- 
tions, is the creation of the people, the organized 
expression of their life, and yet it is likewise true 
that the State in turn affects most powerfully the 
life of the people. The influence of the State per- 
vades every city, village, hamlet, farmhouse, work- 
shop, and fireside like an atmosphere. If that 
atmosphere is malarious, the health of every citizen 
suffers. The black code legalizing and protecting 
human slavery acted like a rank poison, threatening 
to destroy our national life. Fortunately an over- 
dose brought on a crisis, with an upheaving that 
left the body politic weak, but purged and convales- 
cent. The iniquitous legislation that discriminates 
against the Chinese, though of a milder form, is no 
less marked as a poison that is doing its deadly work. 
On the other hand, the Emancipation Proclamation, 
the laws against polygamy, the enactments in favor 
of educating the Indian and of lifting the mass of 
colored citizens to a higher plane of civilization, act 
as tonics, or rather, they are food, and give health 
and strength to the people. The ideal schoolmaster, 
loving his country as the land that gave him birth, 
and as the cherishing mother whose kindly offices 
have attended him from his earliest years, in whose 
history he takes pride and in whose future his hooes 
are centred, seeks by all proper means to promote 



THE IDEAL SCHOOLMASTER. 26 1 

her weal. He recognizes his obligations as a citizen, 
and gladly shares with others whatever of civic 
burdens the exigency of the times may impose. He 
is not at liberty to wrap the silken folds of his 
scholar's gown about him, refuse to "mix in poli- 
tics," and thus give over the government, with all 
its sacred interests, into the hands of those who 
make politics a trade, who gamble in public offices, 
barter their souls for official plunder, and who, left 
to themselves, would bring upon the republic the 
ruin that inevitably awaits us when good men and 
true no longer feel a personal responsibility, not 
alone for their vote, but for the full, intelligent, 
conscientious discharge of every civic duty. 

Looking over his little flock of pupils, his pene- 
trating eye sees beyond the present into the not 
distant future, when these boys and girls are to be 
the men and women, the fathers- and mothers, to 
whose hands the destinies of the republic are to 
be entrusted. 

In some of his daydreams there comes to him a 
panoramic vision. He sees before him a king seated 
upon a throne, swaying a righteous sceptre over a 
vast realm and mighty people. He is clothed in 
purple, wears a crown glittering with gems, and holds 
a golden sceptre, at whose motions wars are waged, 
peace maintained, and laws enforced. 

The scene changes. Before him rises a judgment 
hall ; men of reverend years and countenances full 
of that majesty that is born of wisdom, experience, 
and high endeavor, and clothed in ermine, typical of 



262 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

their purity of intention, sit to try great causes, 
involving the property, reputation, and life of the 
citizen, and the maintenance of law and equity in 
the land. 

Again the scene shifts. A vast palace of marble 
stands before him, its lofty dome a thing of beauty 
and magnificence. Within are men gathered from 
all sections of the republic to make her laws and 
maintain her institutions. Again he looks, and now 
there comes a scene more impressive than any that 
has yet gone before. On a November day, quietly 
as though it were an ordinary matter, but yet gravely, 
as if appreciating something of the deep significance 
of the act, he sees ten million free men depositing in 
their appointed places the single ballots that make 
and unmake senators, judges, and presidents, revolu- 
tionize society, and reconstruct constitutions. 

Who are these potentates .'' these mighty ones of 
the earth .■' He dreams no longer ; the vision is a 
reality. These little urchins that look up so inno- 
cently, so helplessly, so docilely into his face are the 
future sovereigns, judges, legislators, voters, who now 
look to him for that knowledge, training, inspiration, 
that shall enable them in some degree to fulfil the 
august duties that must devolve upon them as their 
birthright in this land of liberty. Can the ideal 
schoolmaster be less than a patriot who will seek 
by all the means within his power to so administer 
the affairs of his little republic that it shall embody 
and show forth in miniature all those exalted virtues 
which on the broader plane of public action dignify 



THE IDEAL SCHOOLMASTER. 263 

human nature, enrich the national life, and give per- 
petuity to the nation ? He knows 

"That the riches of the commonwealth 
Are free, strong minds and hearts of health, 
And more to her than gold or grain 
The cunning hand and cultured brain." 

The ideal schoolmaster is a scholar — a man who 
knows. He is not necessarily a walking encyclopaedia, 
although -he must be somewhat encyclopaedic in his 
knowledge. Of course he must know facts. He is 
not a Gradgrind attempting to measure the universe 
with a foot rule, and refusing to admit that anything 
has value unless it can be estimated in dollars and 
cents. Nevertheless facts, things done, tangible 
realities, actual verities, lie at the basis of scholar- 
ship. They are the foundation of all reasoning. 
There can be no science without them. There can 
be no intelligence without them. The universe is a 
vast congeries of facts, with some of which the 
scholar is to become acquainted. The teacher's 
knowledge of facts must be in a large degree imme- 
diate, he must grasp them in the concrete. They 
must be a part of his experience. At least typical 
phenomena, physical, metaphysical, historical, must 
pass under his own personal observation, and thus 
afford him a key to booklore. Books are to him 
simply the record of other men's observation and 
reflection, which differ from his own chiefly in being 
more extended. His acquaintance with facts will be 
accurate, not necessarily exhaustive, but so far as he 



264 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

forms a mental picture of phenomena it will conform 
strictly with the reality. He knows facts in their 
relations ; his knowledge is scientific. There are 
no isolated phenomena ; all things are related to all 
things. This universe is an expression of thought, 
the embodiment of ideas. It is a cosmos. Order 
reigns everywhere. Science is but the partial reve- 
lation of the nexus that binds the facts ^ often widely 
separated in time, space, and surroundings — into a 
harmonious whole. 

The ideal schoolmaster, while guiding his pupils 
in their search after facts, leads them to a compre- 
hension of their deep significance, and instructs them 
in the arranging and classifying of the phenomena 
according to their logical relations. The true student 
of nature is he who studiously and reverently thinks 
over again the thoughts of the Creator. The ideal 
schoolmaster's knowledge is catholic ; it is not cir- 
cumscribed by any narrow boundaries. " No pent-up 
Utica " is his. All knowledge is related, no science 
stands alone, nor is any one science supreme. The 
sciences of theology, jurisprudence, politics, language, 
mathematics, biology, physics, chemistry, history, etc., 
are correlated. They are mutually dependent and 
mutually interpretive. The man who knows but one 
thing is ignorant of that ; the master of only one 
science is but a tyro in learning. Besides, all sciences 
are the product of the human intellect, the spontane- 
ous creations of human thought in its painful but 
triumphant march toward the conquest of the secret 
of the universe. They are in their entirety the fruits 



THE IDEAL SCHOOLMASTER. 



265 



of human culture, and they are in turn the necessary 
instruments for the training of the human mind. 

As a ripe scholar the ideal schoolmaster stands 
as an interpreter of the past. His is the key that 
unlocks the vaults where all her treasures are guarded. 
Whatever of truth has been spoken by the great and 
good of old, whether in philosophy, science, or litera- 
ture, is his, and finds in him a friend and conservator. 

The ideal schoolmaster is a philosopher, a lover 
of wisdom, a man who seeks truth for truth's sake. 
Not content with accumulating, arranging, labeling, 
and classifying facts, nor even with the established 
conclusions of science, he pushes his inquiries into 
the realm of the unformulated. While his chief 
business is to sail by the chart and to instruct his 
pupils in the well-established code of navigation, he 
does not hesitate to turn now and then into unex- 
plored regions, and to cast his plummet into depths 
as yet unfathomed. Search after truth is its own 
reward, and, even though unsuccessful, lends a new 
value to treasures already gathered. 

But pedagogy itself offers a wide and inviting field 
for the thinker. The final word in the philosophy 
of education has not yet been spoken. Teaching as 
a science has never yet been fully unfolded. The 
question has even been raised whether there be a 
science of teaching. Certain it is that there are 
many pedagogical empirics ; that traditional methods 
of teaching are largely in the ascendency ; that much 
of our so-called education is not only one-sided and 
defective, but positively unphilosophical, not to say 



266 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

irrational and injurious ; that among the advocates 
of the new education there is lack of agreement even 
on fundamentals, much more on questions of detail. 
We might go further and acknowledge that some of 
those who are reputed to be masters of the philosophy 
of teaching are deficient in skill in applying rational 
methods to the perplexing problems in the daily rou- 
tine of school teaching. Shall we then give up in 
despair and say that there is no science of teaching ? 
that pedagogy is a dream, and the zealous educational 
reformers only dreamers ? This would be to charge 
folly upon some of the greatest minds of the past. 
For Plato and Aristotle, Ouintilian, Comenius, Locke, 
Milton, Rousseau, and others who have philosophized 
on this great theme have been recognized as able 
thinkers, and though they may not have formulated 
a science that will satisfy this critical age, they have 
unfolded great principles, and pointed the way to a 
true philosophy of education. Plato laid the founda- 
tions of this philosophy in his definition of a good 
education as that which " gives to the body and to 
the soul all the beauty and perfection of which they 
are capable." 

Aristotle anticipated Froebel when he advised that 
even the games of little children not yet old enough 
for school should be a preparation for the serious work 
of later years. 

There is now a great body of educational doctrine 
accessible to every earnest student of pedagogy, 
invaluable to every intelligent teacher, and abso- 
lutely indispensable to him who aspires after the 



THE IDEAL SCHOOLMASTER. 267 

highest excellence in the noble work of forming and 
informing the human soul. The ideal schoolmaster 
is a student of pedagogy, makes himself acquainted 
with the labors of those who have sought to give 
a reason for everything done in education, and to find 
a rational method for reaching every desired result. 

He is not an imitator, but endeavors to acquaint 
himself with the nature of the complex being whose 
destiny is so largely committed to his keeping, labors 
long to form for himself a true ideal of education in 
its broadest acceptation, and having carefully con- 
sidered the educational value of the different knowl- 
edges, he is not satisfied until he has worked out for 
himself a method which, while conforming to the 
laws of mind and the logical relations of science, 
will give free play to the individuality of the pupil 
and the personal idiosyncrasies of the teacher. He 
is a philosopher, but philosophizes in order that he 
may be the better workman. The goal of his 
endeavor is action, the fruit of all his toil is liigher 
results in the formation of character. His philos- 
ophy reappears not so much in books as in lives. 
He seeks to form, not a school of philosophy, but a 
school of philosophers. 

Standing on the high vantage-ground of philoso- 
phy, looking at life and its problems through a 
transparent atmosphere, he beholds what escapes 
the vision of less fortunate men. He is a veritable 
seer. He points out defects in reigning ideals, faults 
of execution in their embodiment, suggesting true 
ideals and better methods, and thus ushers in a 



268 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

nobler future. Like some Alpine peak whose snow- 
clad summit glows with the first rays of the dawn, 
and heralds the day while the valleys are still envel- 
oped in darkness, the ideal schoolmaster catches the 
glow of the coming millennium and calls to action 
and to rejoicing. 

As an educator one of his chief functions is to 
train his pupils to think. " I imagine," said Bishop 
Berkeley, " that thinking is the chief desideratum of 
the present age." "The indisposition, nay, the 
angry aversion, to think," says Coleridge, " is the 
fact that forces itself on my notice afresh every 
time I enter the society of persons in the higher 
ranks." Carlyle declares " that a thinking man is 
the worst enemy the prince of darkness can have." 
Dr. Channing affirms that "thought is the funda* 
mental distinction of mind, and the great work of 
life." Sir Joshua Reynolds paid this high compli- 
ment to one of England's greatest men : " What- 
ever merit my discourses have," he said, " must be 
imputed in a great measure to the education which I 
may be said to have had under Dr. Johnson. I do 
not mean to say that he contributed a single senti- 
ment to them, but he qualified my mind to think 
justly. No man had, like him, the faculty of teach- 
ing inferior minds the art of thinking." Locke says: 
" It is thinking that makes what we read ours." 

The power to think, to observe, analyze, compare, 
judge, abstract, generalize, classify, infer, and carry 
on complicated processes of inductive, deductive, or 
analogical reasoning, such as is required of men in 



THE IDEAL SCHOOLMASTER. 269 

even the humbler walks of life, if they would enjoy 
prosperity, health, and happiness, is dependent 
largely upon the habits that are formed in the 
schoolroom under the guidance of the schoolmaster. 
If he be not a thinker, how shall he train others to 
think ? 

The ideal schoolmaster is an artist. The materials 
upon which he works are the bodies and the souls 
of living human beings ; the ideal toward which he 
strives is their full development ; his tools are the 
truths of science ; the principles that guide him are 
the laws of rational life ; the special methods that 
he follows are conditioned upon the especial end in 
view, the peculiar laws of the faculty or power to be 
dealt with, and the nature of the specific truth used 
as an instrument. To succeed he must possess the 
keenest appreciation of the beautiful, since nothing 
in the created universe is more beautiful than the 
human soul ; he must have the clearest conception 
of the completed work in all its extent, proportions, 
and details, for nothing is so complex as the human 
organism ; he needs the nicest discrimination between 
the true and the false, the good and the bad, the 
beautiful and the deformed, since nowhere else is 
one more liable to err than in the training of the 
immortal mind, and nowhere else is error more fatal. 
He requires the most consummate skill because the 
material in which he works is so delicate, the effects 
of his labor so lasting and far-reaching in their con- 
sequences, and mistakes so remediless. The sculptor 
may cast aside a ruined statue, and choosing another 



270 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

block of marble begin his work anew. But the 
teacher's blunders are wounds that never heal, scars 
that are never effaced. The painter may erase his 
work, change its form, color, tone, expression, or 
throw away his disfigured canvas and begin de novo. 
Not so with him whose canvas is the human soul. 
Every stroke is ineffaceable ; the false coloring is 
there for eternity. 

The architect is not limited as to time ; he may 
build to-day and suspend his work to-morrow. Six 
centuries elapsed after the foundations were laid at 
Cologne before the final touch was given to that 
wondrous cathedral. But the artist who seeks the 
unfolding of the human soul must studiously observe 
the set times for his work. An opportunity passed 
never returns. The work of to-day must be done 
to-day. His work is ruled by the imperative now. 
Work of to-day omitted is not only irreparably lost, 
but it renders the full work of to-morrow impossible. 
A stone misplaced to-day is misplaced forever, mar- 
ring the symmetry and endangering the safety of 
all the structure to be built upon it. The musician 
striking a false note simply produces a discord that 
is forgotten or unnoticed in the great volume of 
harmony. The teacher striking a false note mars 
the instrument, and the marring is irreparable. 

Teaching is an art that requires skill, a skill that 
comes by practice and as the result of long experi- 
ence. But it is the skill of an artist, not of an arti- 
san, that is required. Teaching is one of the fine 
arts ; rather, it is the finest of arts. No other is com- 



THE IDEAL SCHOOLMASTER. 27 I 

parable with it. All other arts deal with lifeless 
matter. Teaching has to do with the living soul. 
All other arts are perishable, this is for eternity. 
With the mechanical arts skill is the highest profi- 
ciency, and automatic precision is attainable. The 
man reaches his perfection when he does the work 
of a machine, and machines are continually displac- 
ing men. But in teaching, the skill needed is the 
cunning of the mind and not of the hand. It is the 
delicate poise of the judgment, the keen intuition 
into motive, the remorselessness of reasoning, the 
inflexibleness of will, the directness of aim, the turn 
of a sentence, the flash of an eye, the detection of 
falsehood, and the uncovering of error, the judicious 
blending of praise and blame, the wisdom of help 
withheld and of aid proffered, the quick discernment 
of evil tendencies, and tact in developing any latent 
power of that wonderful piece of mechanism the 
human body, as well as of perception, memory, 
imagination, thought and feeling, ability to arouse 
energy, kindle enthusiasm, restrain passion, regulate 
desire, direct conscience, and enthrone reason, this is 
the skill required of tJiis artist, the ideal schoolmaster. 
There are now and then in the world's history 
gifted souls who, Hke Leonardo and Michael Angelo, 
combine the genius of architect, painter, and sculp- 
tor. But it rarely happens that men excel in more 
than one Une of artistic work. To the schoolmaster 
is reserved the high distinction of manifoldness in 
artistic results. Under his skilful training there 
awaken to consciousness souls of the most various 



272 



STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 



endowments — one to achieve distinction as an 
orator, another as a leader of armies, another as a 
great thinker, a poet, or a sculptor, still another as 
an explorer, opening up new continents, or an 
inventor turning to new uses the forces of nature. 
His is the rare prerogative of recognizing the exist- 
ence of these possibilities, calling into action these 
slumbering powers, and guiding to glorious results 
these godlike energies. 

He is not so much a scholastic artist, however, as 
an artistic schoolmaster. His love of order, system, 
beauty manifests itself in everything about him : in 
the attractiveness of the school-grounds, the arrange- 
ment of his programme, the movements of classes, 
and in the consummate skill with which government 
— quiet, unostentatious, effective — is maintained. 
To him school discipline is not an ideal to be 
worshiped, but a servant whose aid is most valued 
when least obtrusive. It is an instrument to be 
kept bright, sharp, and ready for use when needed, 
but out of sight when not called for. 

And, finally, the ideal schoolmaster is a Christian ; 
not a sectary nor a bigot, but a man who, without 
cant or hypocrisy, reverences God and recognizes in 
Jesus Christ the ruler of the universe. That won- 
derful being whom we call man has a religious nature 
as well as a body and a mind. If it is true, as Plato 
has said, that a good education is the full develop- 
ment of man in his entirety, then it must include 
the unfolding of that which is the crowning excel- 
lency of man's nature, his religious susceptibilities. 



THE IDEAL SCHOOLMASTER. 



^n 



That education which secures to him merely the 
training of his body makes him only a magnificent 
beast. That which affords him an intellectual train- 
ing alone may make of him a Mephistopheles, a 
sort of human devil, acute, cunning, capable, but 
unprincipled and full of all subtlety. That training 
which would secure to him the health of body, vigor 
of mind, and discipline of his moral powers, would 
fit him for citizenship, but if it left him untaught 
religiously, it would make of him only a cultivated 
heathen. Man is not a congeries of disconnected 
natures. He is a unit. Education pertains to him 
in his entirety. A complete education is a symmet- 
rical education. Man without a relisrious training: 
is like a kitigdom without a king, an army without 
a general. He may be admirable for what he sug- 
gests, a splendid torso, but nothing more. 

It is impossible for man to attain to complete 
manhood without the unfolding of each and all his 
powers. Not only is the higher conditioned upon 
the lower, but the lower nature depends upon the 
higher for its full significance. 

The ideal schoolmaster is not necessarily a 
preacher, and he does not push his religious tenets 
to the forefront, much less is he an offensive propa- 
gandist of any narrow creed. But he is a man whose 
entire being is adjusted to its environment. As a 
member of society he is in sympathetic relationship 
with his fellows. As a creature of the earth he under- 
stands nature's laws, loves her ways, and yields obedi- 
ence to her requirements. As a self-conscious being 



2 74 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

he is at peace with himself ; and as a spiritual being 
he is at one with his Maker and Judge. What he is 
nimself, sincere, honest, truthful, devout, he— more 
by example than by word, rather by the alchemy of 
godly living than by means of formal instruction — - 
strives to render his pupils. 

Man may be likened to the magnificent cathedral 
at Milan. His physical nature is the deep-laid 
and massive foundation ; his intellectual nature the 
strong walls with buttresses, towers, and vaulted 
roof ; his aesthetic nature supplies the statues, the 
noble windows, and the golden treasures in the sac- 
risty ; his moral nature may typify the great organs, 
the choirs, and the vestments ; while his religious 
susceptibilities find their counterpart in the voice of 
prayer and songs of praise, which, rising from ten 
thousand lips, mingling with the joyous strains of 
the organ, rise and swell until filling all the vaulted 
arches of the mighty pile, they float away heavenward 
to the ear of Him for whose worship this beautiful 
temple was built. 

Man without religion is a temple without worship. 
An irreligious teacher is one who constructs a cathe- 
dral without thought or care as to what use shall be 
made of it. 

The ideal schoolmaster, then, is one who rejoices 
in the highest prerogatives of manhood, strength of 
body and greatness of soul ; a philanthropist who 
thinks nothing foreign to himself that pertains to 
man ; a patriot who feels a personal responsibility in 
promoting the weal of the Republic ;. a scholar rever- 



THE IDEAL SCHOOLMASTER. 275 

encing the past and sifting from its history all that 
is true and beautiful and good ; a thinker grappling 
independently with life's problems, pinning his faith 
to no man's sleeve, but forming for himself and others 
credal statements ; an artist who, knowing the dififi- 
culty and delicacy of his self-appointed task, bends 
every energy to attain requisite skill, so that the 
trained hand and the educated eye may work in uni- 
son for the accomplishment of its high endeavor ; a 
devout man, who seeks as the reward of his life not 
fame, riches, or power, but the consciousness of duty 
done toward his pupils, his country, his race, and his 
God. 



XIX. 

THE TRUE FUNCTION OF A NORMAL 
SCHOOL. 



Empirical methodology binds the teacher down and makes him 

a pedant; philosophical methodology, especially if enriched with 

the history of education, gives him the freedom and liberty of the 

spirit, 

S. S. Laurie, 

The average teacher stops growing wdthin a short period after 
achieving fair success — three to five years being the ordinary limit 
fixed. The teacher educated at a normal school is more likely to 
continue growing throughout the entire career, 

William T. Harris, 



There is in the teacher's profession the same difference which is 
observable in all other human employments between the skilled and 
the unskilled practitioner, and that difference depends, in a large 
measure, on a knowledge of the best rules and methods which have to 
be used and the principles which underlie and justify these rules. 

J, G, Fitch, 

That every normal school should have a model and training 

school has long since been established by law in Germany, and is no 

longer a question of debate. As the late Director Kehr said : " A 

normal school without a training school would be like a swimming 

school without water." 

Charles De Garmo. 



XIX. 

THE TRUE FUNCTION OF A NORMAL 
SCH00L.1 

Many of the questions now stirring the educational world must be 
worked through to the end in the normal school. 

— Thomas B. Stockwell. 

In this paper the term " normal school " is used 
as a generic term, applicable to that class of schools 
in America in which teachers are trained. The 
specific work of any particular school must be 
determined by any peculiar circumstances that con- 
ditipn its activities. The discussion undertaken in 
this case is limited to American schools. 

The plan of the essay is as follows : An intro- 
ductory sketch is given of the tout ensemble of 
educational agencies in order to bring into bold 
relief the work of the school-teacher. 

Next, with a view of showing the function of the 
normal school, an outline of study is given, a plan 
of a training-school sketched, the special function of 
the school in relation to the profession is set forth, 
and some considerations are offered against the pre- 
vailing custom of doing so much academic work. 

Owing to the peculiar structure of our government 
we have no national system of education, such as 
obtains in Prussia. Each State has its own system, 

1 Prize Essay. Award of the American Institute of Instruction, 1885. 
279 



28o STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

and these are by no means alike. It is consequently 
impossible to speak of the American system of edu- 
cation except by way of accommodation, and then 
only in general terms. 

GENERAL SURVEY. 

The active agencies at work to mold our national 
life by the instrumentality of teaching, and which are 
immediately affected by the normal school, are the 
following : — 

1. The family. The child's first teacher is the 
mother ; his first school, the nursery. The atmos- 
phere of the home life is a most potent factor in 
molding the child's character. All of our youth 
must graduate from the home into the school, where 
their career will be largely determined by the influ- 
ence of the home. 

2. The idea now widely obtains that it is necessary 
for every State to provide the rudiments of education 
for the whole body of children of school age. The 
Republic, because it is a republic, — a government 
of the people and by the people, — must, as a matter 
of self-preservation, see to it that the essentials of 
good citizenship, intelligence, and civic virtue shall 
be universally diffused. To secure this the State 
establishes and maintains at public expense free 
schools, open to all. These schools comprise the 
district (chiefly ungraded), the primary, and the 
grammar schools. There are also many private 
schools of corresponding grades. 



THE NORMAL SCHOOL. 28 I 

The two specific ends aimed at in the common 
school should be the awakening of the faculties and 
the impartation of that knowledge that will be of 
the most practical utility. The pupils are to be 
trained for freedom and for usefulness. Every child 
is to become a producer, and not a pauper ; a law- 
abiding citizen, and not a criminal ; a respectable 
member of society, and not a tramp ; an intelligent 
voter, and not a tool for demagogues ; a patriot, and 
not a partisan. 

There is a growing sentiment that the work of the 
common school should be made in the highest degree 
practical. It does not and can not impart a liberal 
education. It aims at immediate practical results, 
rather than at culture. The mass of those who 
receive its benefits go no further in their studies, but 
enter at once upon life's duties, which means in too 
many cases a mere struggle for existence. There 
are many advocates of some sort of industrial train- 
ing in connection with the public schools, to take 
the place, in some degree at least, of the old system 
of apprenticeship, which will give to the laboring 
classes something of skill and so relieve their toil 
and break their bondage. Competition, which natu- 
rally increases with the growth of the population ; 
division of labor resulting from the growing com- 
plexity of our civilization and the tyranny of trades 
unions dominated largely by foreigners, many of 
whom have had a technical education abroad, 
would seem to necessitate some practical enlarge- 
ment or addition to our present educational agencies 
for the masses. 



282 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

It should not be forgotten, however, that the 
higher grades of schools, soon to be mentioned, 
are largely recruited from the district and grammar 
schools. The seeds of culture sown there are to 
reach their maturity in the university. The door of 
every country schoolhouse should open towards the 
college. 

The work of the common school is characterized 
by its elementary nature, its thoroughness and prac- 
ticalness. The administration of a firm and wise 
discipline, the inculcation of good principles, the 
formation of correct habits, the awakening of a 
lofty ideal of life and duty, and the development 
of a manly character, as well as the awakening of 
mind and the imparting of knowledge, enter into 
the responsible duties of the common-school teacher. 
The far-reaching results that must flow from the 
common-school work lend to it great dignity and 
importance. The qualities requisite in a common- 
school teacher are good natural endowments, an 
established character, a mastery of the subjects to 
be taught, skill in governing, aptness in teaching. 

3. Next above the schools just described are a 
group of those that may be called secondary. They 
are the high schools, academies, seminaries, and pri- 
vate fitting-schools. Receiving its pupils from the 
grammar schools, the high school attempts to do a 
threefold work. First, to complete the task of fitting 
the student for the duties of life by giving him 
an acquaintance with the elements of the natural 
sciences, especially in their relation to the arts and 



THE NORMAL SCHOOL. 283 

trades. Its mathematical drill extends to algebra, 
geometry, and surveying. Second, it seeks to impart 
something of liberality to the culture by giving its 
students a knowledge of rhetoric, literature, 
history, English composition, etc. And third, it 
seeks to give to those who desire to pursue a 
college course a preparation that will fit them to 
do so with ease and profit. 

There are several open questions in relation to 
the high school ; for example. How can the course 
be modified so as to meet the varying wants of the 
pupils .'' In some cases the high school already 
embraces at least three so-called departments : a 
boys' English department, a girls' English depart- 
ment, and a classical department. Should the indus- 
trial idea prevail it may be forced to still further 
differentiate its work. Another question is in regard 
to the enlargement of the course, so as to enable 
those who cannot pursue a college course to receive 
in the high school as near an equivalent therefor 
as possible. Still another of great moment is the 
adjustment of the high-school work to that of the 
college. 

It is very evident that the requirements for those 
competent to fill chairs in these schools must increase 
more and more. Broader scholarship, riper experi- 
ence, and greater weight of character must be com- 
bined with practical skill and knowledge of life. 

4. The colleges constitute a third grade of schools. 
These embrace a wide range of diverse institutions, 
some founded and maintained by the State, others 



284 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

established by private munificence. Many of them 
are scarcely more than high schools or academies ; 
others — like Johns Hopkins ^ — -are universities. 

The most marked feature in the present status of 
the older and stronger colleges is their development 
into universities, giving greater liberty of choice and 
larger range of studies. The methods of teaching 
are correspondingly changing. Original research, 
lecturing, and laboratory work are increasingly 
important. 

5. Last of all, and completing the chain, are the 
various technical schools, each designed to train 
students to excel in some chosen calling or profes- 
sion. The law, medical, and theological schools, the 
military and naval academies, the art schools and 
schools of technology, aim to give a minimum of 
general culture and a maximum of special instruc- 
tion. The special fitness of a teacher for these 
schools is his grasp of the science and mastery of 
the technique or art of his calling. 

CONCLUSIONS FROM ABOVE SURVEY. 

The most obvious suggestions arising from this 
hasty survey of our educational agencies are the 
following : — 

1. Education is a very complex process and involves 
the cooperation of very diverse agencies. 

2. All these agencies — home, school, college, 
university — are parts of a great scheme, all work- 
ing toward a common end, — to fit men and women 



THE NORMAL SCHOOL, 285 

for life in general and the individual for his particu- 
lar sphere. They constitute a solidarity, and what 
affects one affects all. They act and react upon 
each other. 

3. There is a vast aggregate (say three hundred 
thousand) of men and women who may be classed 
as public teachers — those who give their time and 
energies wholly or chiefly to this work. With the 
enormous growth of our population this number is 
steadily increasing. 

4. There is a rapid increase in the proportion of 
female teachers. In a prominent western city (small) 
almost every teacher is a woman. The great mass 
of normal-school pupils are women. In thousands 
of cases the only school training ever received is from 
women, and very frequently they themselves have 
never been taught by men. 

5. The most momentous question which now con- 
fronts the American people is that of public educa- 
tion. All other considerations are subordinate to 
this. The nation is committing its very existence, 
as well as its highest weal, into the hands of its 
school-teachers. These considerations lead naturally 
to the discussion of the question of the true function 
of the normal school. 

The vast and increasing number of persons de- 
manded as teachers in our public and private schools, 
and the wide influence exerted by them, call for 
careful consideration of the means for securing 
those best qualified for teaching. In the opinion 
of very many the normal school is the best agency 



286 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

yet devised for fitting teachers for their especial 
work. What, then, is the true function Of the 
normal school ? The general reply is at hand : 
the normal is a professional school whose distinc- 
tive work is to prepare men and women to teach, 

COURSE OF PROFESSIONAL STUDY. 

But the question demands a more specific answer, 
which will be furnished in part by outlining a course 
of study, which, subject to modifications, would best 
meet the wants of candidates for the profession of 
teaching. 

Anthropology. The teacher's business is to care 
for, develop, train, and instruct children and youth. 
That which underlies all his work and renders any 
intelligent performance of his duties possible is a 
knowledge of the child-nature. 

I. He needs to know physiology. Education neces- 
sarily has to do largely with the body. Not only is 
the ideal goal, sana mens in sano corpore, but all the 
processes of mental and moral culture are dependent 
upon physical conditions. The teacher needs a 
thorough knowledge of the structure of the body 
and of the laws of hygiene. The questions of venti- 
lation, heat, exercise, overwork, recreation, are so 
vital that nothing save careful, special investigation 
of them in their direct practical relation to school 
teaching can insure even an ordinary regard for the 
pupils' physical well-being. 

If any other considerations are needed to enforce 



THE NORMAL SCHOOL. 287 

this requirement they may be found in the fact that 
many of the simplest laws of hygiene are constantly 
violated in schools of all grades, and that school life, 
which should result in physical robustness, produces 
multitudes of physical wrecks. 

2. The teacher needs to know psychology. The 
watchmaker must know the internal structure of the 
watch ; the engineer, that of the engine. So the 
teacher needs to be especially versed in the mental 
constitution. Teaching, whether regarded as a pro- 
cess of drawing out the intellectual powers or as 
imparting knowledge, is conditioned upon the laws 
of mental growth and assimilation. No teaching 
can be successful that does not comply with these 
laws. There may be good teachers who have never 
made a formal study of psychology apart from their 
observations upon their scholars and their unsyste- 
matic reflections upon the facts observed. A careful 
study of the science of the mind before entering 
upon the work would, however, have greatly facili- 
tated it, saved them from mistakes, and spared their 
pupils the inconvenience, and oftentimes injury, of 
being experimented upon. The human mind has a 
very complex organization, and the laws of its develop- 
ment can be understood only by careful study. The 
special fitness of particular studies for the training 
of mental powers is apparent only by surveying the 
powers to be developed in close connection with the 
studies designed to develop them. 

The remedy for the one-sidedness of education, 
resulting from the too common method of cramming 



288 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

the memory, can only be found by such a study of 
the human mind as will bring into bold relief the 
various powers — perception, memory, imagination, 
the thinking and reasoning faculties in their mutual 
relations. 

3. The course should include a study of the ethical 
nature. The human being is capable of the most 
varied affections, appetites, desires, emotions, etc. 
He has a conscience and a will. His happiness and 
his usefulness depend upon the proper unfolding of 
these powers. He is to grow up, not to a life of 
selfish indulgence, but to be a member of a com- 
munity, considerate of the rights of others. The 
teacher who would train this being for the proper 
performance of all his social duties and the enjoy- 
ment of all his privileges, must make a careful study 
of the laws of his moral growth, strive to form 
correct habits, and to unfold a high order of moral 
character. 

His study of ethics may include also an investiga- 
tion into that body of accepted moral truth recognized 
by all as essential to the regulation of mutual inter- 
course in society. 

The teacher is to influence his pupils chiefly by 
moral power, the plying of right motives. He will 
be greatly aided in this by a study of the child's heart 
and an examination of the fundamental principles of 
right government. 

4. This group of studies pertaining to man is not 
complete without logic. This is essentially psycho- 
logical. The laws of right thinking are quite as 



THE NORATAL SCHOOL. 280 

important as the laws of right feeling. The liio-hest 
outcome of intellectual education on its practical" side 
IS the power to think profoundly and with ease and 
pleasure. To analyze, compare, reason, form just 
judgments enter largely into the practical duties 
ot life. There may be correct thinking without the 
study of formal logic, just as there may be correct 
speaknig without formal grammar, and elegant expres- 
sion without rhetoric. But grammar and rhetoric are 
acknowledged to be in a high degree helpful, when 
properly studied, to a correct and elegant use of the 
mother-tongue. So logic, both as a science and an 
art may be so taught as to greatly aid in securing 
kill m detecting fallacy and error, in investigating 
truth and m properly arranging thoughts for the 
greatest effectiveness. 

A special reason for teaching logic in normal 
schools IS Its relation to methods. The proper divi- 
sion arrangement, classification, and presentation of 
a subject are simply so many forms of applied logic 
The suitable teaching of every subject, the definitions 
in geography, the inductions in natural science, deduc- 
tions in geometry, analyses of sentences in grammar 
examination of literature, construction of essays, aH 
depend upon a practical knowledge of correct thinkino- 
or logic. *=" 

These anthropological studies that have been named 
as the basis of a normal-school curriculum might be 
supplemented in advanced courses by inquiries into 
e hnology and sociology, and whatever else would 
thiow light upon man as an educable being. These 



290 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

Studies pertaining to man are pursued in all colleges 
and many high schools. But instruction in them 
in the normal school should be thorough, comprehen- 
sive, and with constant reference to their pedagogical 
bearing. 

If those who enter the normal school could be 
thoroughly well informed in the facts of physiology, 
psychology, ethics, and logic, as a condition of 
entrance, it would be all the better for them; the 
time could be spent in exhibiting the significance 
and use of those facts in the work of education. 

PEDAGOGY. 

This group of studies should be followed by 
another, which may be termed pedagogical. This 
consists of : — , 

I. A71 inqiiiry into the philosophy of education. 
Education, considered as development, is simply 
evolution, or an unfolding to maturity of activity 
and strength of all the powers of the human being. 
It differs from evolution in matter, as in the tree or 
animal, in this : in man it is the result of conscious 
effort on the part of the individual. All psychologi- 
cal growth is conditioned upon exercise. All educa- 
tion, therefore, must be self-education. It is evolu- 
tion from within. It is a process self-originated, self- 
directed, and terminates in self. The function of the 
teacher is chiefly that of supplying the external con- 
ditions for the maintenance of the native energies, 
the protection of them from unhealthy employment 



THE NORMAL SCHOOL. 29 1 

and dissipation, and the furnishing of the opportuni- 
ties for their exercise. 

The child's individuality and freedom should be 
sacredly respected. All educational processes are 
to be based on a careful study not only of child- 
nature in general, but also of the idiosyncrasies of 
the individual pupil. Education seeks primarily the 
formation of right habits, physical, mental, and 
moral. Its purpose is to put the child en rapport 
with his environment, nature, society, Gpd. Every 
child is a man in miniature, a possible type of the 
race, capable under education of attaining an exalted 
degree of capacity for enjoyment and power of per- 
formance. The ideal good in education is to put 
within the range of every individual, without regard 
to sex or social status, the attainment of the noblest 
possibilities. It is to enable each one to make the 
most of himself for time and for eternity. 

The philosophy of education necessarily embraces 
such questions as physical training, college sports, 
and school amusements, the co-education of the sexes, 
industrial education, courses of study, and all other 
matters that pertain to the broad subject of the 
completest unfolding of man in his entirety, and his 
fullest equipment for duty and privilege here and 
hereafter. It sweeps the whole field of educational 
endeavor, public and private, in all its grades and 
stages ; comprehends all its aims, means, motives, 
and agencies, and seeks to secure the highest results 
for all concerned. 

II. A history of education. Much is to be learned 



292 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

as to both the philosophy of education and methods 
of ter.ching by studying the systems of education 
that have been formulated, the theories that have 
been promulgated, and the methods recommended 
and followed by those who have wrought on this 
great question in past ages. Nothing, perhaps, so 
liberalizes the mind of the teacher as the intelligent 
study of the words and ways of such men as Locke, 
Ascham, Rousseau, Comenius, Pestalozzi, Froebel, and 
Spencer. 

III. Didactics, or the principles of training. There 
has come to be recognized a very considerable body 
of principles, or first truths, regulative in their char- 
acter, and very suggestive and helpful to the young 
pedagogue. To analyze these, discuss them, trace 
them in their origin, and to follow them to their 
practical issue, are valuable exercises. Some of 
these aphorisms may be instanced: — 

1. Exercise is the fundamental law of growth. 

2. Each faculty must be exercised in accordance 
with its own laws of unfolding. 

3. The chief aim of all primary teaching is mental 
development. 

4. Nothing should be done for a child that he can 
be led to do for himself. 

5. Interest on the part of the pupil is the sine qua 
non of all satisfactory progress. 

6. There is a proper order for the development of 
the faculties which in general statement is, first, the 
perceptive faculties, then the memory, power of lan- 
guage, imagination, and last of all, the reasoning 
powers. 



THE NORMAL SCHOOL. 



293 



7. The studies to be taught should be chosen with 
reference to especial ends. 

8. They should be adapted to the age and attain- 
ments of the pupil. 

9. In the early stages of a liberal education the 
studies .are chiefly disciplinary, and teachers should 
so use them. All should be so correlated, however, 
that one will lead naturally to another, and together 
they should form a system. 

10. In the later stages of education, whether long 
or short, some reference should be had in selecting 
the studies to be pursued to the future occupation of 
the student. 

IV. Methodology. Didactics has to do with training 
or development, while methodology investigates the 
laws of instruction, or impartation of knowledge. 
Didactics discusses the laws of growth ; methodology, 
the laws of unfolding truth. Didactics has to do 
with mind ; methodology, with matter. Didactics 
is concerned with drawing out ; methodology, with 
putting in. They often run parallel, and are some- 
times confounded, yet they are really distinct in their 
province of inquiry, separate in thought, and should 
be discussed apart. Methodology includes a discus- 
sion of isolated principles, or fundamental truths, and 
also of the systems founded upon them. Among 
the subjects treated under methodology may be men- 
tioned : — 

I. The kindergarten. This is really a system or 
method devised by Froebel to initiate in the mother's 
arms, and in the nursery, the work of child culture. 



294 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

2. Objective teaching. The first stages of all 
education should be experimental. When the child 
has acquired the power of gaining knowledge readily 
and accurately without helps, then objects hinder 
instead of aid. 

3. The topical method of presentation is to be 
followed as soon as the attainments of the pupil 
will justify it, 

4. The art of questioning constitutes a very im- 
portant element in all methods of instruction where 
recitation is used. 

5. Analysis and synthesis, induction and deduction, 
the study of words and the study of things, thought 
and expression, knowing and doing, memory and rea- 
son, should as far as possible go hand in hand. They 
should never be violently severed. 

6. The text (or reference) book and oral teaching 
should supplement each other. 

7. For the higher grades of instruction the lecture 
system has special advantages. 

8. Laboratories, apparatus, and illustrative mu- 
seums are helpful in all stages of instruction. 

9. The pupil is to be incited at every stage of his 
progress to independent research, observation, experi- 
ment, verification, thought, etc. 

10. In general, we are to proceed from the concrete 
to the abstract, simple to complex, the part to the 
whole, and vice versa, and from known to unknown. 

V. Methods. After this general survey of method- 
ology, or rather in connection with it, instruction 
should be given in the method of teaching special 



THE NORMAL SCHOOL. 295 

subjects, such as form, color, size, weight, number, 
place, time, and language, to young children : read- 
ing, writing, spelling, drawing, plants and animals, to 
those older : arithmetic, grammar, rhetoric, geogra- 
phy, literature, history, the natural sciences, etc., to 
advanced pupils. 

While it may be that there is no one method to be 
followed in teaching any subject, every subject is best 
taught by a method, and he is most likely to find the 
best method who diligently and intelligently seeks 
for it. 

VI. School economy. The student who has a clear 
idea of the nature of the being to be educated, and 
the character and method of the education, is pre- 
pared to consider the organization of the school, the 
making of a programme, the keeping of records, the 
administration of discipline, the legal rights and 
limitations of the teacher. For an advanced grade 
of students it would be proper to discuss the build- 
ing and furnishing of schoolhouses ; heating, lighting, 
and ventilating ; duties of school officers, including 
superintendents ; the grading of schools, school sys- 
tems, etc. In short, whatever pertains to the admin- 
istration of our complex school system would furnish 
suitable topics for this course. 

Before leaving this branch of my theme let me 
say that it would not be necessary, or even desirable, 
perhaps, that each class should pursue this entire 
course. It would be sufficient if the normal schools 
could give such instructions in the great fundamentals 
as would set students thinking, and so teach them 



296 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

that in all these questions they would be likely to 
reach right conclusions. Thus their influence could 
not fail to be profound, far-reaching, and healthful. 
It would eventually pervade the entire teaching force 
of the country. 

It will thus be seen that great stress is laid upon 
the thought that one great function of the normal 
school is to formulate a body of educational doctrine. 
Perhaps nowhere more than in teaching is seen the 
power of truth. Any reforms in educational ideas or 
methods become effective only when they become 
controlling forces in the teachers. At no time are 
teachers so impressible, so open to receive truth, 
as during that formative period of preparation when 
they give themselves up to be taught. When rightly 
taught as above they will be aggressive, independent, 
and wisely conservative. 

It is worthy of especial consideration that the 
problem of education, while old and involving inva- 
riable elements, is essentially a new problem, to be 
worked out by each new generation in its own way. 
On its practical side education is the training of the 
individual for citizenship ; that is, for the successful 
discharge of the particular duties of his special sta- 
tion in life. But a man's duties are determined by 
his environment ; that is, by the demands of the ever- 
changing civilization amidst whose influences he lives 
and labors. 

Educational doctrine must embrace not only the 
unchangeable element of man's nature, but also the 
changeable elements of the life of which he makes a 



THE NORMAL SCHOOL. 297 

part ; and normal schools must recognize these truths 
in their teaching. 

PRACTICE SCHOOLS. 

Along with this professional instruction the work 
of next highest importance to be done by the normal 
school is to train its pupils in the actual work of 
teaching. There is a science of teaching, and any 
person will be a better teacher if, before entering 
upon his work, he masters at least the rudiments of 
that science. The more familiar he is with these 
elements, the more easily can he apply them in his 
work in the schoolroom. 

But teaching is no less an art in which the highest 
success is attainable only through practice. Experi- 
ence is the verifying process that must make evident 
to him the truth of his philosophy. Under a wise 
system of teaching under criticism pupils may very 
greatly expedite the matter of acquiring both experi- 
ence and skill. A student is better prepared for the 
independent work of the schoolroom by even a few 
weeks' preliminary handling of classes. As difhcul- 
ties and perplexities occur they are referred to the 
master for solution, mistakes are corrected, and excel- 
lences are acknowledged and commended. By this 
means it should be noted that the schools would not 
only be saved in a measure from the blunders of inex- 
perienced teachers, but, what is a matter of the high- 
est importance, they would be permanently spared 
the infliction of those who by this testuig process 
are found wantinsr in the essential elements of 



298 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

success as teachers, and are refused certificates, and 
advised to seek otlier callings. 

How the normal school shall supply the need of 
training, and so fulfil this important function, is a 
mooted question. Several methods are followed. 
One is to allow the undergraduates, or pupil-teachers, 
to teach under the eye of a head teacher, who has 
the chief responsibility for the discipline and pro- 
gress of the class. Another is to assign pupil- 
teachers to particular classes for definite periods of 
say ten weeks, and hold them responsible for arrang- 
ing the work, instructing the classes, and maintaining 
discipline. Their work is frequently inspected by 
their appointed critics, and their failures and suc- 
cesses are pointed out. This system varies widely 
in some of its details. For example, in some schools 
no teaching is done until the pupil has finished his 
professional studies. In others the study of method 
and practice in teaching go together. Another 
method, wholly distinct from this, is to call upon 
the pupils, each in his turn, to teach his own class. 

It is not my purpose here to criticize these various 
plans. It is sufficient to say that in my judgment, 
formed after a somewhat varied experience and wide 
observation, a practice school is an essential factor 
in a complete normal school ; that pupil-teachers 
derive an invaluable experience by teaching veritable 
children, and actually exercising authority for a con- 
tinuous series of months ; and that under proper 
supervision this can be done without detriment to 
the children. 



THE NORMAL SCHOOL. 299 

THE MODEL SCHOOL. 

A third great part of normal-school work is to 
embody and exhibit the highest type of a school. 
It should be a model school. The grounds, build- 
ings furnishmgs, apparatus, cabinets, libraries, the 
c assification, instruction, and discipline, should be 
of the highest order. The faculty should represent 
the last best word in the educational world, be ever 
on the alert to catch the newest theory, and to adopt 
and hold fast that which is good. The school, in 
order that it may be a complete object-lesson, should 
embrace the kindergarten, the primary, intermediate 
grammar, and high school grades. There are several 
reasons for such a school. First, it is a complement 
to the philosophic ideal, showing that what ouo-ht to 
be may be. Second, it enables the pupil-teachers to 
become familiar, by actual participation in the daily 
life of such a school, with the best principles of 
government and methods of teaching. Third such 
a school IS an object-lesson of great value to the 
general public, putting before them in concrete and 
impressive form the new education. 

CHARACTER BUILDING. 

The great fact Should not be overlooked that the 
normal school is, first of all, a school, a seminary of 
earning not only, but a place for character buikiino- 
It IS so to train the pupils -the future teachers- 
as to repress the evil and foster the good in their 
lives ; to form habits of system,. punctuality, industry, 



300 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

self-control, independence, thoughtfulness, moral ear- 
nestness, etc., so that they shall be prepared to teach 
by example as well as by precept, by their lives as 
well as by their words. 

The most forceful fact in the teacher's work is 
his personal character. What he is, what he loves, 
what his ideals are, what he thinks, by what motives 
he is governed, what company he keeps, what books 
he reads, even what his amusements are, all enter 
vitally into his work as a fashioner of youthful minds 
and manners. The normal school, by wise methods, 
inculcates noble principles, holds up for imitation the 
best examples of the teacher, and strives to create in 
the minds of its pupils an ideal of the schoolmaster 
toward which they are ever to aim. 

A PROFESSIONAL SPIRIT. 

Even a cursory glance at the relation which 
teaching sustains to the well-being of humanity and 
the progress of the race in all that is good in per- 
sonal character, domestic and social life, art, science, 
industry, government, philosophy, and religion, shows 
that it ranks along with the highest of human call- 
ings. Luther said, " If I were not a preacher, I 
would be a teacher." Teaching should stand high 
among the professions. It should be rigorous in its 
exactions of the requirements of those who seek to 
enter it, lay special stress upon character, learning, 
and largeness of soul, and jealously exclude the 
unworthy and the incompetent. It should allure 



THE NORMAL SCHOOL. 30I 

to its ranks the noblest spirits by offering the best 
facilities for the prosecution of their chosen work, 
suitable recompense for faithful service, social recog- 
nition, and a reasonable certainty of fixed tenure of 
office so long as the work is efficiently performed. 

Normal schools, properly equipped and ably man- 
aged, having before them the one distinct object of 
training men and women for this high office, do by 
their very existence call attention to the difficulty, 
importance, and dignity of the profession. By the 
philosophy which they teach, the methods they pur- 
sue, the standard of requirement for admission, the 
elimination of the incompetent, the dismissal of the 
unworthy, and especially by constantly adding to the 
number of those thoroughly fitted for good service, 
the normal school awakens a professional spirit — a 
philosophic, philanthropic, patriotic spirit — in those 
who give themselves to this high calling, not as a 
means of livelihood, a dernier ressort, but as to a noble 
lifework, to which they may worthily devote all their 
energies and attainments. 

THE PROCESS OF EDUCATION IDENTICAL. 

Much mischief has resulted from violently sepa- 
rating education into distinct stages. The process 
of education is an identical one, the same throughout 
all its progress from the cradle to the college. It is 
the same mind taking its initiative lessons as it learns 
to recognize its mother's smile, which later pursues 
its investigations by peering into the heavens through 



302 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

the telescope, deciphers monumental inscriptions, or 
searches into the deep things of religion. The same 
laws govern its growth and acquisitions throughout. 
The philosophy of education embraces the whole 
scheme of psychical evolution, and recognizes it as 
subject to the same general laws of didactics and 
methodology. Formerly it seemed to be thought 
that any one could teach children, and that without 
special preparation. Now the drift of public senti- 
ment seems to be that only primary teachers need a 
professional training. 

PROFESSIONAL TRAINING FOR ALL TEACHERS. 

The truth seems to be that, in order to attain the 
highest results, all who teach, whether in the home, 
the school, or the college, need a special training for 
the work. The lecturer in the university, the pro- 
fessor in the college, the teacher in the high school, 
no less than the grammar master, the primary in- 
structor, and the kindergartner, require not simply 
culture, education, but pedagogical training. 

A very important part of the normal-school work 
is to train men and women for all grades of school 
teaching, especially the higher grades. Any one at 
all familiar with the work of high schools knows that 
much of the teaching in them is very faulty. Worse 
teaching than is done in some of the high schools and 
academies is, perhaps, nowhere to be found, unless 
it be in some of the colleges. Many a college grad- 
uate goes haltingly through life, simply because his 
instructors were ignorant or negligent of their work 



THE NORMAL SCHOOL. 303 

as teachers. Normal-school training that would serve 
to improve the work done in many of the colleges 
would be a national benefit. Besides this, the uni- 
versities and colleges are the centres of thought, and 
the educational ideas and methods that obtain in them 
will be dominant over all those who come under their 
influence. If those who are to teach there could 
have a special pedagogical training for their work, 
the influence of both their example and precept 
would be immediate and profound in developing a 
professional spirit. The young men aspiring to posi- 
tions as teachers in high schools, academies, normal 
and grammar schools — ■ all of whom should be col- 
lege bred — would be influenced to seek a normal 
training. The mass of teachers for country schools 
must come from secondary schools. If these were 
taught by professional teachers we should at once 
have a class of men and women imbued with a pro- 
fessional spirit. The influence of college and high 
school would thus be enlisted on the side of normal 
schools, instead of being indifferent or hostile. 

West Point trains men not simply to act as second 
lieutenants or captains of companies, but also as 
colonels of regiments, brigade, division, and corps 
commanders, and as generals-in-chief to command 
the armies of the United States. Grant, Sherman, 
Sheridan, Hancock, Meade, McClellan, Thomas, were 
all trained in the military academy, and the history 
of their achievements vindicates the policy of the 
government. The normal school, as a professional 
school, should do for the teaching profession what 
West Point has done for the profession of arms. 



304 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

The theological seminaries do not spend their 
strength in fitting men simply to be pastors of 
feeble country churches. They strive to give such 
a training as will fit them for the most difficult posts, 
where the severest demands will be made. Natural 
selection and the survival of the fittest do the rest. 
The strongest and ablest go to the front, the weaker 
fill the easier positions. Andover, Union, Princeton, 
and similar schools strive to furnish leaders, and 
thus to lift up the whole body of the profession. 
The high places demand men of professional train- 
ing. The example is contagious, and few country 
churches are now satisfied with an untrained pastor. 
The theological schools begin at the top, and so 
reach the mass. 

The normal school, as at present organized, is not 
doing that work. Practically it sets itself to the 
task of training men and women — chiefly women — 
for primary and grammar school work and for teach- 
ing in the rural districts. By arranging its course of 
study and lowering its standard of admission to 
accommodate those who seek to fit themselves for 
teachers in lower-grade schools, it practically shuts 
out those who have had a university course and who 
aspire to teach. Few of the teachers in university 
or high schools have ever had a professional prepara- 
tion for their work, or have ever seriously thought 
of having such. So long as the highest places in 
the profession of teaching are open to and filled by 
unprofessional men, the profession itself must suffer 
from the lack in professional skill of those who have 



THE NORMAL SCHOOL. 305 

knowledge and culture, but lack ability to train and 
impart. 

The normal schools in America are doing a good 
work, and have helped to bring about a condition of 
things and a state of public sentiment which is already- 
calling for something better. The establishment of 
chairs of pedagogy in colleges is in response to this 
sentiment. The point insisted upon here is that the 
time has come for the establishment here and there 
of normal schools of high grade, designed expressly 
and exclusively to give a strictly professional training 
to college graduates and others possessed of a liberal 
education, to fit them for the best work in teaching 
in high schools, academies, normal schools, colleges, 
and universities. 

Undoubtedly one function of the normal school is 
to train teachers for the country schools and the 
lower grades of city schools ; but what is here in- 
sisted on is that this is not its only or its chief work. 
There is the same need of professional training for 
teachers for the higher grades as for the lower. The 
conditions of teaching in the country districts are 
such that there is little inducement for those who 
have a normal training to remain there permanently. 
If they aspire to teach in the city they at once come 
into rivalry with graduates of college and high school, 
who, though without professional training, have the 
advantage of broader culture and of local influence. 

In so far as normal graduates who have had only 
a grammar-school training before entering the nor- 
mal are employed as headmasters in grammar schools, 



306 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

teachers in high schools, professors in normal schools, 
to the exclusion of college-bred men and women, it 
may well be questioned whether more harm than good 
may not ultimately result. Technical training can- 
not take the place of scholarship. Breadth is indis- 
pensable to the highest culture, and should be required 
of every teacher of high grade. The normal school 
is not to displace the college and the high school, nor 
to rival them, but to supplement their work ; not to 
substitute technical training for scholarship, but to 
add to culture the best professional training. 

ACADEMIC WORK. 

A large part of the strength of normal schools is 
spent in giving their pupils the rudiments of the 
common-school studies. They do academic instead 
of professional work. Against this policy it may be 
urged that it is a waste of resources. The normal 
schools are required to do what the grammar and 
high schools should do. It creates rivalry and 
jealousy between the normal and high schools. It 
degrades the normal from a professional to a second- 
ary school, thus helping to defeat its own end — the 
creating of a professional spirit. It fatally lowers 
the standard of attainment that should be required 
of every teacher. It overcrowds the course of study, 
and, by attempting to teach both matter and method, 
does neither with thoroughness. It attempts the 
impossible. Students need more culture and disci- 
pline than are now required upon entering normal 



THE NORMAL SCHOOL. 



307 



schools, and the separation of matter and method 
before they can fully grasp the significance of 
methodology. 

A complete separation of matter and method, a 
thorough differentiation of the normal school into 
that of a strictly professional school, would, it is 
believed, be productive of the following results : 
The normal schools would at once take higher rank 
and compel greater respect. The ranks of college 
and high-school teachers and grammar masters would 
be more largely recruited from the normal graduates. 
The professional work would be better done. Normal- 
school teachers would turn their energies toward pro- 
ducing pedagogical literature rather than schoolbooks. 
Normal students would go out with more clearly 
defined notions of what constitutes professional train- 
ing than they now possess. The antagonism between 
high school and. normal school would at once cease. 

It is worthy of note that in the early educational 
history of this country the great institutions of learn- 
ing were designed as theological schools, and their 
work was miscellaneous and elementary. By a 
natural process of evolution and differentiation, the 
academy, the college, and the university have grown 
out of the divinity school. The divinity school proper, 
now leaving to these the work of general culture, 
seeks to do strictly professional, post-graduate work. 

The normal school is undergoing something of the 
same healthy metamorphosis. The improvement and 
multiplication of the schools of all grades where 
those who wish to teach can receive the requisite 



o 



08 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 



instruction in the subjects to be taught, and the 
growing public sentiment, or rather demand, for a 
higher order of professional training, unite in render- 
ing it possible and desirable for the normal school to 
do distinctively and exclusively professional work. 

CONSERVATIVE CHANGES. 

Of course no radical revolutionary change should 
be suddenly introduced. That here suggested should 
be gradual. One such school might be enough to 
start with. It would be soon followed by others. 

For the present, under the traditions of the normal 
schools, and with public sentiment as it now is, they 
will be obliged to do academic work. But it should 
be done under protest, and with a constant aim at 
realizing the true ideal of the normal school as an 
institution of high order, graded to meet the neces- 
sities of persons of varied ability, taste, and destiny, 
admitting only those whose scholastic attainments 
warrant it, and giving to them the broadest and most 
thorough professional culture possible, and so recruit- 
ing all grades of the profession of teaching with those 
who will give it dignity and do for the public the best 
kind of work. 

It is absolutely necessary that those who teach 
should be well grounded in the studies required in 
the schools in which they teach ; and if those who 
enter the normal school are found deficient in these 
studies it will be necessary for some time to come, 
as it has been in the past, to provide some means for 



THE NORMAL SCHOOL. 309 

a thorough review. Where there is a well-organized 
practice school the academic work can be done there. 
In some cases a preparatory department may be main- 
tained ; in others the normal faculty must do this 
work. But so far as possible it should be separate 
from the professional work, and should be distinc- 
tively and professedly academic, with stress laid 
upon the fact that the work is extra normal and 
temporary. 

SUMMARY. 

To sum up, the normal school is a professional 
school, and ranks with the theological seminary, law 
school, medical school, and military academy. Its 
place is that of a post-graduate school. Admission 
should be limited to those who have completed their 
academic or scholastic work. Its spirit, methods, 
equipment, and teaching force should be of the 
highest order. Its instruction should be confined 
to those subjects which sustain the most intimate 
relation to the peculiar work of the teacher. Its 
great function is to add constantly to the number 
of those who dedicate themselves to teaching as a 
lifework, and who seek to become, by personal char- 
acter, scholarship, and pedagogical skill, able to do 
the best kind of work in whatever sphere of teach- 
ing they enter, whether in the kindergarten, the 
grammar, high school, college, or professional school. 
It should seek, by concentration of energy upon 
strictly professional work, to touch the profession 
at every point and vitalize and ennoble it in every 
part. 



XX. 

ADVICE TO YOUNG TEACHERS.^ 



1 The following series of familiar " talks " in the form " Advice to Young 
Teachers " will, it is hoped, be of practical help to young teachers about 
entering upon their work. Students who have graduated from the Rhode 
Island Normal School in the classes from 1884 to 1889 will recognize here 
the substance of addresses given to their respective classes at graduation. 

311 



Man, it is within yourself, it is in the inner sense of your power, 

that resides nature's instrument for your development. 

Pestalozzi. 

The price of retaining what we know is always to seek to know 
more. We preserve our learning and mental power only by increasing 
them. Henry Darling. 

In fact, what we learn at school and in college is but the founda- 
tion of the great work of self-instruction and mutual instruction with 
which the real education of life begins when what is commonly called 
the education is finished. Edward Everett. 

Patience, diligence, quiet, and unfatigued perseverance, industry, 
regularity, and economy of time, as these are the dispositions I would 
labor to excite, so these are the qualities I would warmly commend. 

Hannah More. 

Whatever I have tried to do in life, I have tried with all my heart 
to do well. Charles Dickens. 



XX. 

ADVICE TO YOUNG TEACHERS. 

It is the man who takes in who can give out. The man who does 
not do the one soon takes to spinning his own fancies out of his 
interior, Uke a spider, and he snares himself at last as well as his 
victims. — Dr. John Brown. 

THE TEACHER'S CALLING. 

An aimless life is an empty life. He only lives who 
sets .before himself a high and noble purpose, and 
then with resolute endeavor girds himself for the 
great struggle, counting all toil light and all sacrifice 
easy if he but win the crown. 

In what nobler calling could you engage than in 
teaching ? It is a work of great difficulty, calling 
for talents of a high order, for varied attainments, 
for zeal, persistence, industry, fidelity, and other 
high qualities of soul. It is a work whose impor- 
tance cannot be stated in words. The teacher is not 
to be compared to the potter whose skilful hands 
mold the unresisting clay into wondrous shapes of 
symmetry and beauty ; nor to the sculptor who 
evokes from the dead marble the statue which, 
though matchless in grace and dignity, is still but a 
lifeless thing, marred by a blow and shattered by 



SH 



STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 



a stroke. It is the teacher's prerogative to deal 
with life, to call into exercise the manifold powers of 
the soul, to lead it to apprehend the marvelous 
beauties of this wondrous universe, to awaken 
thought, that the mind may rise to at least some 
dim consciousness of its divine origin by thinking 
over again the thoughts of God embodied in his 
universe. It is the teacher's exalted privilege to 
assist in training noble men and women. Kings 
and queens may bestow patents of nobility written 
upon parchments. Teachers evoke a veritable no- 
bility of soul, which needs no outward sign. The 
teacher works not for time but for eternity. The 
noblest monuments of art perish, even the pyramids 
decay, and the proudest empires lose their power. 
But the work of the teacher, wrought upon inde- 
structible mind, and incorporated into the very fibre 
of the immortal spirit, shall endure when granite 
mountains are worn away and the material universe 
itself has been dissolved. 

The teacher's work, passing beyond the realm of 
the individual, reaches to the family, exalts and 
ennobles the home, pervades society with its benign 
influence, strengthens the foundations of the State, 
contributes to the glory of the nation, adds new 
dignity to the race whose noble deeds are in part 
certainly the outcome of his labors. 

The teacher is the common benefactor of all 
classes. The success of the farmer, the skill of the 
artisan, the gains of the merchant, the genius of 
the artist, the eloquence of the orator, and the 



THE TEACHER'S CALLING. 



15 



wisdom of the statesman, each and all are enhanced 
by the wise training of the faithful teacher. The 
common-school teacher is preeminently the friend 
and benefactor of the common people, the industri- 
ous sons of toil upon whose labors depend the weal 
of society and the prosperity of the State. The 
common-school teacher, representing the organized 
effort of the Commonwealth, and the ripest results 
of modern scholarship, takes by the hand the child 
of the humblest citizen, and gives to him that 
training and scholarship which starts him in the race 
of life as a peer of the lordliest, and puts within his 
grasp the most coveted prizes of life. The university 
is a beacon light that warns of hidden rocks of 
communism and socialism. The common school 
excavates these rocks and makes of dangerous straits 
safe, deeply flowing channels. 

In choosing the work of teaching, you have chosen 
that which, while affording scope for a lifetime for 
all that is excellent in you, will also, in so far as you 
open your souls to its reflex influence, continually 
ennoble, enrich, and beautify your own lives. 

I congratulate you upon the auspicious time for 
entering upon your work. Even adverse criticism 
and fault-finding is a sign of healthy interest in 
popular education. Never before has there been 
a time when so much thought was given to this 
great subject. The profound quarterlies, the sprightly 
monthlies, the weekly journals, the daily press, the 
pulpit, the political parties, the state and national 
legislatures, besides numberless assemblies of teach- 



3 1 6 'S' TUDIES IN FED A GOGY. 

ers, are discussing education in all its phases, while 
money is poured out like water for the erection 
of schoolhouses, the providing of apparatus, the 
employment of teachers, and the founding of 
institutions, in order that the people may share in 
the blessings of education. And never has there 
been a time when the capable, faithful teacher was 
so sure of complete recognition and generous reward 
as now. The future is full of promise. I congratu- 
late you upon entering upon such a work at such a 
time. 

THE NEW AND THE OLD. 

You are about to enter upon your work in the midst 
of a good deal of turmoil in the educational world. 
The air is heavy with discussions ; there is a sharp 
conflict of ideas. Much is said in favor of the new 
education ; and the old education has its earnest 
advocates. There is much that is vague and misty 
in this discussion. Precisely what is meant by the 
new education is not clearly understood. Some 
understand the term new education to mean the 
teaching of physical science ; some the kinder- 
garten ; some the so-called natural method ; some 
the common-school system, and some identify the 
new education with the teachings and practices of 
the late superintendent at Ouincy. Without enter- 
ing into this controversy, it is sufficient to say that 
there are two pretty clearly marked parties — the 
conservatives and the radicals. There are those 
who cling to the old as the nc plus ultra of human 



THE TEACHER'S CALLING. 



317 



endeavor. They regard all change as revolutionary 
and treasonable. The other party discard the old 
because it is old, and welcome the new because it 
is new. 

You are not called upon to take sides with either 
of these parties. Nor are you to be indifferent to 
both. The extremists of both parties are wrong. 
You are to accept that which is true and follow 
that which is best, whether in the new or in the old. 
The subject of education is not a new subject. It 
is as old as the human race. It has claimed the 
attention of great thinkers, and engaged the highest 
activities of great teachers in all ages. Plato and 
Ouintilian among the ancient, Locke, Comenius, 
Pestalozzi, and Froebel among later writers, have 
grappled with the question philosophically, while 
every age has had its systems of instruction. The 
schools of the prophets founded by Samuel, three 
thousand years ago ; the schools that have always 
followed in the wake of Christianity ; the schools 
organized by Charlemagne ; the network of tuition 
thrown by the Jesuits over all Europe ; the great 
universities of England and the Continent ; the 
system of popular instruction devised by our fathers, 
have each had their peculiar excellences, and ac- 
complished for the race, in their day, much that 
is admirable and enduring. The teacher should be 
a student of history. The historic spirit is a con- 
servative spirit. We are to conserve the true and 
the good. It was not without wisdom that our 
fathers planted the elms that have weathered the 



3l8 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

blasts of centuries, and in whose grateful shade we 
sit to-day. They are a heritage from the past to be 
cherished and loved and venerated. Nothing in 
modern times surpasses in massive endurance the 
pyramids of Egypt ; while the matchless beauty of 
the old Greek temple is the consummation of art. 
In* education we are debtors to the past, and our 
highest wisdom lies in the reverent study of the 
educational theories and practices handed down to 
us from other generations. Antiquity lends an 
added charm to whatever is true and beautiful and 
good in art, culture, or religion. 

On the other hand, the changed conditions of 
modern life, the new systems of science and 
philosophy, the constant efforts made to bring 
within the reach of the many the results of the 
investigations and studies of the few, necessitate 
a remodeling of our systems of education, a 
reconstruction of our courses of study, and an 
improvement in our methods of instruction. 

INDEPENDENCE. 

You are not to be imitators and copyists. Teaching 
is not a trade that can be taught by rule. You will 
not succeed in your work by simply doing as you 
have seen others do. Be yourselves ; study the 
minds and dispositions and surroundings of those 
whom you are to train ; make yourselves masters 
of the subjects you are to teach ; form for yourselves 
methods of teaching of your own, and devise your 
own systems of government, and then, with reverent 



THE SIGNIFICANCE OF DIFFICULTIES. 



319 



regard for truth and excellence, whether old or new, 
do that which seems best to you. With no spirit of 
bravado or irreverence, and no assumption of su- 
periority, but with a spirit of humility and meekness, 
seek industriously for the truth, and when you find 
it pursue it. Progress of any kind in human society 
is only possible as the result of independent thinking, 
and action based on that thought. The spirit of the 
new 'education is a spirit of freedom, of liberty, of 
progress. Call no man master; be slaves to no 
system ; follow blindly no method. Be studious, 
thoughtful, industrious, true to your convictions and 
faithful to duty. 



THE SIGNIFICANCE OF DIFFICULTIES. 

In the course of your work you will doubtless 
meet with difificulties and discouragements, and your 
spirits will sometimes not be as buoyant as to-day. 
If at such times you should be tempted to despond, 
remember that trials are incident to life. No one 
escapes. They belong to life as life. They are a 
part of our discipline. The soul seems to need them 
as indispensable means for its own development. 
Recall that maxim with which you have become so 
familiar — " Exercise is the law of growth." Some 
of the noblest powers of the soul are called into 
exercise only by the emergencies of life. The true 
greatness of the soul is made manifest by its manner 
of meeting trials. It required banishment and exile 



320 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

to reveal the transcendent glory of the character of 
Roger Williams. The greatness of Lincoln could 
only be measured by the vastness of the difificulties 
he met and overcame. One of the chief glories of 
life is in bearing bravely its trials. The electric 
lights that flash out from the Brooklyn bridge dazzle 
by their brilliancy, but it is the strength of the mas- 
sive granite piers upon which the vast structure 
depends for its great utility. Sweet indeed are the 
uses of adversity, if rightly improved. Patience, 
resignation, fortitude, courage, hope, industry, are 
some of the high qualities of soul that can only 
flourish under trial. Poverty is not to be despised, 
labor is not a curse, defeat is often only a larger vic- 
tory in disguise. 

If you should be tempted to think your trials 
peculiar, remember that this is only because you 
yourselves are peculiar. No soul is like another. 
Every life is peculiar. The heart knoweth its own 
bitterness. Strive to show yourselves peculiar in 
the heroism with which your trials are borne. Glad- 
stone the Premier was great when bearing upon his 
Atlantean shoulders the burdens of an empire. Glad- 
stone the citizen is no less great in the equanimity 
with which he bears defeat. 

Wealth, luxury, ease, leisure, are very doubtful 
blessings. They are seldom accompanied with hap- 
piness, and certainly not always with goodness. 
The chief if not the only value of money is that 
the responsibility for its care, safety, and right use 
call for the exercise of high qualities of soul. Its 



INDEPENDENT THINKING. 



321 



responsibilities are fully commensurate with its 
pleasures. It corrupts and degrades quite as many 
as it ennobles. Wealth is simply opportunity. Its 
value depends upon its use. 

Verily, 
I swear, 'tis better to be lowly born 
And range with humble livers in content, 
Than to be perk'd up in a glistering grief, 
And wear a golden sorrow. 

Trials are but opportunities. Yielded to, they 
enslave and crush us ; conquered, they crown us 
kings. 

Strive then, dear friends, to make the most of 
every day. Get good from everything. Be cheerful 
and hopeful. 

Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's. 
Thy God's, and truth's. 

And may He whose kindly watchcare has brought 
us all safely to this glad hour of your graduation, 
keep you to the end of life's jornney, grant you all 
the success that you can endure, and sanctify to you 
whatever of trial you may be called to undergo. 



INDEPENDEiNT THINKING. 

The truth presses itself upon me with great 
emphasis that the controlling forces of life are not 
words, nor anything else that comes from without. 
The secret springs of life lie within us. Your work, 



322 



STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 



your failures, your successes, will be determined very 
little by what may be said to you by others. Words 
will have less and less weight. 

Your course will be determined far less by what 
you hear than by what you think. Words are but 
symbols, thoughts are powers. Not other people's 
but your own thoughts are the great forces that will 
mold your lives. The perplexing questions that 
will confront you are to be thought out. Life's 
problems are genuine test examples. They are 
unclassified, accompanied by no rules, and have no 
answers. There is no "Teacher's Edition" to be 
had at any price. In solving them you can have 
little or no help from either books or friends. For 
this test cramming will not avail, tears will not help 
you, no favoritism will be shown, and no mistakes 
will be made in the marking. Although cheating 
may seem to be helpful for a time, yet in the long 
run the only thing that will be found truly service- 
able to you will be downright honest, patient, 
persistent, careful thinking. The one great power 
on which we must chiefly rely in the shaping of our 
lives is the power to think. That godlike gift, by 
virtue of which we grasp rugged facts in their 
relations and principles, trace effects to their remote 
and hidden causes, and see at a glance the far- 
reaching and diversified results of present agencies, 
enabling us to shape our action by immutable law 
and unchanging principles, and to have a valid reason 
for everything we do, is the crowning glory of our 
being. 



INDEPENDENT THINKING. 323 

You will be compelled to do your own thinking. 
No one will or can do it for you. Even when you 
consult authorities it will be well to be able to go 
behind opinions to the reasons, and below these to 
the primal facts on which they rest. You must 
work your own way out of darkness into light. 
Sunshine dispels darkness ; water quenches fire ; 
winds drive away fogs ; so thought clears away 
doubt, refreshes the mind, and makes clear the 
line of action. If you have not learned to think 
you will be like children crying in the dark ; or like 
sheep driven to the market ; or like slaves subject to 
your masters. You will be like ciphers occupying 
vacant places, until the significant figure, whose 
place you temporarily fill, comes to claim it for 
himself. But if you have learned to do your own 
thinking, and a little meanwhile for other people, we 
may bid you godspeed, and safely predict for you a 
career of usefulness and honor in any sphere suited 
to your capacities and attainments. 

You have heard much of methods, but there is no 
regal method except the method of rational thinking. 
To do the right thing at the right time and in the 
right way — -this is the substance of method; and 
the secret of it cannot be formulated, much less 
communicated ; it cannot be learned, but it is to be 
thought out. 

You have heard much in advocacy of reading, but 
it is better to think than to read. Reading without 
thinking is a sort of mental dissipation. The demand 
of the hour is for teachers' thinkins: circles. Think- 



324. STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

ing transmutes reading into knowledge, knowledge 
into science, science into culture, culture into char- 
acter, and the whole into power. 

Cultivate the habit of thoughtfulness. Thinking 
is hard work ; it taxes the mind, wearies the brain, 
tires the body. It exhausts the energies much more 
than manual labor. The brain, considered as the 
organ of thought, is the most wonderful piece of 
mechanism ever wrought. Nothing less than divine 
wisdom could have contrived it. To use this organ 
is one of the highest prerogatives of man. Man is 
a rational animal. To think is to be man ; what then 
is it not to think .'' 

The motto which you have chosen is peculiarly 
significant. "Why, and what then.'*" It suggests 
philosophic inquiry, a search for causes and results. 
Nothing exists in this world without a cause. Vapors 
rise and snow falls. Why } Planets revolve about 
their sun, and suns about their centre, and every- 
where in the universe is order, system, law, intelli- 
gence. Why ? 

To-day you finish your course of study, and we 
bid you farewell. "What then.''" To-morrow you 
enter the schoolroom and stand in the presence 
of groups of children who will look to you for 
instruction, training, counsel, example. What then ? 
In a few short years — they will seem as days — your 
pupils will stand before you as you now stand before 
me, to hear your parting words before they take 
their places in life as productive forces. What 
then .^ The final day will come ; accounts will be 



INDEPENDENT THINKING. 



325 



balanced ; records will be made up ; rewards will be 
distributed ; you will stand looking out into that 
endless future whither we are all hastening. What 
then ? 

The other day I heard a teacher from a neighboring 
State repeating the motto of his class, adopted many 
years ago when he was a senior in a normal school: 
"Deeds not words." All these years, he said, he 
had tried to live up to that motto. May you live up 
to the spirit of yours. Ever seek to find answers to 
these great questions. I do not mean that you are 
to become philosophers at a single bound. Thought- 
power is of slow growth. Time and experience are 
requisite for its perfection. You are not necessarily 
to become reformers. Great thinkers who revolu- 
tionize by their thoughts are rare. One or two in a 
century suffices. The world has not yet embodied 
in deeds the ideas of its master-thinkers. Much less 
are you to be iconoclasts. The world is full of the 
treasures of thought, more precious than works of 
art. They are to be reverenced, loved, and protected. 
Seek not to destroy, but to conserve. Least of all 
do I counsel you to become what are styled "free 
thinkers." All of our thinking is limited by law and 
reality. He who discards these limitations is like a 
sea-captain who destroys his chart and compass and 
cuts away his rudder, in order to be free to sail the 
ocean at his own sweet will. Alas ! he is no longer 
free, but is helpless, the sport of the wind and the 
victim of storms. 

Accept the spirit of your motto, which is an 



326 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

inquiring spirit, a thoughtful spirit, a philosophic 
spirit. Modestly, earnestly, within your own sphere, 
in all practical matters, in school and out, think. 
And so far as in you lies grapple with the great 
questions of the day, social, educational, political, 
literary, religious, and form your own independent 
judgments thereon. And our fervent wish for you 
each is that the results of what the brain thinks and 
the will accomplishes may be all that the heart 
desires. 



CULTURE, CITIZENSHIP, CHARACTER. 

To-day your thoughts are turned to the future, 
toward what may be, rather than to what has been. 
You are young, and your spirit is that of hope, 
prophecy, and endeavor, rather than of reminiscence, 
eulogy, and congratulation. You seem to have been 
unconsciously influenced by this spirit in selecting 
your motto, "Consider the End." You are to be 
enrolled with that vast body of men and women who 
are attempting to administer the public-school system 
of America. You dedicate yourselves to a great 
purpose. You embark in an enterprise without a 
parallel in the annals of the world. When before did 
any people ever undertake to bring the blessings of 
a liberal education within the reach of every boy and 
girl of school age, and to afford to all alike, without 
regard to sex, color, or class, the inestimable benefits 
of mental culture .'' The nation seeks through you 
and other teachers of its common schools to lift to 



CULTURE, CiriZENSIIIF, CHARACTER. 327 

a high plane of independent manhood and woman- 
hood a whole generation of its youth. This is truly 
a heroic endeavor worthy of those whose sublime 
faith in humanity has been shown in the declaration 
of human equality, the emancipation of a race of 
slaves, and the experiment of universal suffrage. 

The nation whose destiny you are to help mold 
will number in your day one hundred million people. 
In extent of territory, in wealth, in population, in all 
the essential elements of civilization, in dignity at 
home and influence abroad, you will see the 
United States standing among the very foremost 
nations of the globe. Her preeminence will be 
acknowledged by the world. You and the thou- 
sands who, like you, now enter upon your noble 
lifework in the schoolroom will by your teaching 
help to win for the Republic that proud place. 

In the attainment of this ultimate end, you and 
your fellow-teachers in the free schools of America 
are to seek to do these things : — 

I. To bring about, so far as possible, a common 
life among our peoples. Our population comprises 
representatives of all nations, languages, classes, 
and creeds. English, Scotch, French, Germans, 
Irish, Italians, and Africans ; Protestants, Catholics, 
and atheists ; nihilists, anarchists, socialists, and 
communists, all are here. The children who will 
enter your schoolrooms will in some cases be unable 
to understand one another. They will represent the 
most violent antagonisms, political, social, and reli- 
gious. When they leave your presence see to it that 



328 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

they go speaking the same language, eager in the 
same pursuits of knowledge, loving the same institu- 
tions, loyal to the same flag, proud of the same his- 
tory, and acknowledging the one God the maker of 
us all. 

The fathers may indeed be strangers, aliens, ene- 
mies. See to it that the children shall be compan- 
ions, friends, brethren. 

2. Another end that you are to consider is the 
promotion of the intelligence of your pupils. I do 
not mean simply that you are to teach them the 
mere facts of arithmetic, grammar, and geography, but 
that you are to train them to form intelligent opin- 
ions on these and other subjects. Everything can- 
not be taught in the common schools, but children 
can be trained to think correctly about a great 
variety of things. And it is this power of thinking, 
of reaching right conclusions, of forming deliberate 
judgments, that is to be sought for in teaching. 
Facts are only aids to thinking. What a man thinks 
is vastly more important than what he knows. 
Knowledge is only a means to an end ; wisdom is 
an end in itself. 

I remember that I address young women. But I 
rejoice in the thought of that new era for women 
which is bursting upon us, an era symbolized by the 
fact that the State entrusts its destiny to women by 
making them almost exclusively the teachers of its 
common schools. To-day and here it is the privilege 
of women as never before and nowhere else to have 
opinions of their own on questions of literature, 



CULTURE, CITIZENSHIP, CHARACTER. 329 

philosophy, history, and politics, and to have a voice 
in molding public opinion. The girls who come to 
you are to be stimulated to high thinking, to intelli- 
gent participation in all the great philanthropic and 
moral enterprises of the day. Seek to awaken in 
them aspirations after the broadest culture within 
reach. 

3. But a higher end than wisdom is good citizen- 
ship. The State has educated you with great care 
and at large expense, in order that you may be com- 
petent to fit its youth for the right discharge of their 
duties as citizens. You are to train them to be not 
only capable of forming right opinions on questions 
of public interest, but to be able and willing to dis- 
charge their public duties. They must not only 
know them, but must actually perform them. They 
must be taught not only to admire truth and virtue, 
but must be trained so that they will not only in 
ordinary but in extraordinary cases, as voters, jurors, 
witnesses, legislators, judges, aldermen, and congress- 
men, prove faithful to their trust, prefer the public 
weal to private gain, and hold their honor above all 
price. Consider good citizenship, honor, integrity, 
fidelity, active participancy in public affairs, shirking 
no duties and fulfilling all obligations, as the final 
end for which the State has educated you as teachers. 
Those who are to sit under your teaching and feel 
the molding power of your influence ought to go 
out into life better prepared for all its duties. They 
should be better workmen, better overseers, better 
husbands, and better wives. Education should touch 



330 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

the mainsprings of mind and heart and will, and 
make itself manifest in all the relations of life. 
It should change the individual, the family, the 
Church, the State ; affecting both rich and poor, 
capital and labor, and improve not only the opinions 
and social customs, but also the laws and institutions 
of the State, the nation, and the race. 

4. Once more let me ask you to consider that the 
final end of all teaching is not knowledge or wisdom 
or conduct, but character. In considering the lives 
of the heroes of the past we are not satisfied with a 
knowledge of what they knew or thought or did. 
We ask. What kind of men were they } It is not 
the hero of many battles that we love to recall, but 
the man Grant, humane in battle, magnanimous in 
victory, undismayed by defeat, just in misfortune, 
patient in sickness, thoughtful for his family in the 
last great struggle with death. These are the high 
qualities of soul that touch our hearts, awaken our 
pride, and arouse our enthusiasm. The glory of a 
nation is the manhood and womanhood it produces. 
This is the goal toward which the family, the school, 
the Church, and the State all strive. 

In devoting yourselves to the high calling of teach- 
ing you place yourselves in the very centres of power. 
In no other place can you work so effectively for 
humanity. Nowhere else can you, by precept and 
example, by teaching and by training, exert an influ- 
ence in shaping the national character which will be 
more deeply, widely, and permanently felt than in 
the schoolroom. This consideration of the noble 



WORK' OF THE PRIMARY rEACHER. 33 I 

ends of your labor may serve to stimulate you to do 
your best work. It will quicken you in the hour of 
sluggishness, sustain you in discouragement, com- 
fort you in toil, and reward you when your work is 
done. 



THE WORK OF THE PRIMARY TEACHER. 

The subject to which you have given much special 
attention is that of the primary school. You have 
thought and talked of the little ones, their first days 
at school, their first impressions, and their first les- 
sons. The subject is one of fascinating interest 
and of the weightiest moment. I cannot do better, 
perhaps, in these last words to you as a class, than 
to deepen the impression already made in your minds 
on'this great subject by suggesting some foundation 
thoughts. 

I. That which underlies all else is the thought 
that the primary teacher has to do with living souls. 
The schoolroom is a place of life, not of death, of 
growth from within ; and all your methods and 
processes are to be governed by this one supreme 
fact. Life has its own laws, and asserts itself in its 
own way. A sculptor may evoke from the marble 
whatsoever form he wills, because the marble is 
passive. The teacher is not a sculptor ; he does 
not deal with matter, he deals with mind. He 
cannot shape mind as he will, but must conform 
to the laws of its development. He stands in the 
presence of a mighty force which he may hinder 



332 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

indeed, but which he cannot radically change and 
make other than it is. Every child by virtue of his 
birthright is the peer of the teacher. To educate him 
properly he must study him thoroughly. The soul is 
not clay to be molded, wax to be stamped, paper to 
be written on, a vessel to be filled, nor even a 
diamond to be polished. It is a living force to be 
nurtured, trained, developed. It demands oppor- 
tunity, conditions of growth, favorable environment. 
Carefully foster the growth of these living souls. 

2. A second thought is that you have to do with 
free beings. In the primary school especially, where 
children seem so helpless, so plastic, so completely 
at the mercy of the master, we need to be on our 
guard lest we attempt to play the despot. We are 
not to rule absolutely, but to preside. Where there 
is life there must be liberty. Everything that the 
teacher does for the education of the child is condi- 
tioned upon the child's will. If he does not choose 
to learn, the teacher's work is vain. Compulsion is 
without efficacy unless it issue in choice. Sponta- 
neity is an invariable accompaniment of life, and 
should as far as possible characterize every school- 
room. Frost is not more destructive of the bursting: 
bud, than arbitrary repression of the growing mind. 
Let liberty have its proper place. 

3. The spirit of the primary school should be a 
spirit of love. What sunshine is to the garden, love 
is to the schoolroom. Lichens will grow on rocks, 
and stunted oaks are found in high altitudes ; some 
hardy flowers may bloom even in the snow. But 



WOEI^r OF THE PRIMARY TEACHER. 333 

luxuriance of vegetation, rich fruits, and golden 
harvests are the products of warmer climates. That 
which is noblest, sweetest, best in child-life is evoked 
by sympathy, gentleness, patience. The primary 
school needs a summer climate. It is only as we 
enter into closest relationship with the child-heart 
that we reach and move that delicate and yet mighty 
engine, the child's will. Whom the child loves he 
obeys. Fear degrades, paralyzes, dwarfs ; love enno- 
bles, quickens, makes grand. The child that loves 
truth, beauty, goodness, strives for them, and by the 
striving becomes good and beautiful and true. Let 
love reign. 

4. But I would not be understood to favor law- 
lessness. The primary school must be a place of 
lav/. What I plead for is that the law may be rational 
and not arbitrary. The principle of loyalty is deeply 
imbedded in the human soul. Man from his very 
nature is an obedient animal. While he craves 
liberty, he heartily concedes homage. The child 
loves order, system, rule, and submits easily and 
happily to control if wisely managed. There must 
in every school be rules and regulations, laws and 
penalties, restraint, discipline, government. But it 
should be such government as is consonant with the 
highest welfare of the child and the deepest demands 
of his nature. The laws of the schoolroom should 
be only such as are necessitated by the nature of the 
case; they should be founded on justice, enforced by 
wise penalties, and administered in loving firmness. 
The child's obedience should seem to spring from 



334 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

within. The law should as far as possible be self- 
imposed. What is most desired is not obedience, 
but loyalty. Servile obedience is degrading whether 
in child or man. School discipline is not designed 
to foster obedience for its own sake. But loyalty, 
a glad, free subjection to law, is ennobling. The 
soul can never outgrow the need of loyalty. The 
school should seek to cultivate this spirit. A child 
loyal to truth, to duty, to conscience, will be loyal to 
the State and to God. Encourage loyalty. 

The primary teacher who enters the school with 
this high ideal of the nature of the work, realizing 
the forces to be dealt with, the ends to be aimed at, 
the methods to be employed, the spirit to be culti- 
vated, will find the schoolroom an enchanting place, 
and the work there full of inspiration. Each day 
will bring its own reward, and each trial will have its 
compensation. To witness the young minds growing 
in power to know, to feel, and to do, and, under the 
sweet influences of liberty, law, love, and kindly 
guidance, becoming wise, strong, and good, will be a 
sight ever new, beautiful, and glorious. 

Let these be your foundation words — life, liberty, 
love, loyalty. 



THE TEACHER'S GROWTH. 

We expect very much of you in the future, and in 
order that you may know what our hopes are, I will 
briefly enumerate some of the things which we hope 
you will do. 



THE TEACHER'S GROWTH. 335 

We expect you to continue to be students of 
pedagogy. During your connection with tlie nor- 
mal school your attention has been directed to this 
subject ; you have worked faithfully and successfully, 
and have made a good beginning. But all that we 
have aimed to do has been to open the matter before 
you, give you a clew to it, awaken an interest in it, 
suggest books and plans of study, point out some of 
its practical bearings, and acquaint you with some 
of its elementary truths. We think that most of 
you are now prepared to begin for yourselves an 
extended, systematic, thorough investigation of this 
great subject. Pedagogy is a philosophical science. 
It rests upon definitions and first principles. Its 
parts are correlated and mutually dependent. Its 
laws can be formulated, its conclusions verified, its 
principles admit of exact application, and their 
results can be anticipated with a large degree of 
certainty and precision. But the data for the 
science must be gathered from many and widely 
diverse fields. Pedagogy is the science of devel- 
oping the human soul to its highest degree by means 
of teaching. It involves, therefore, a knowledge of 
man in his entirety. Not merely psychology and 
physiology, but anthropology, history, logic, rhetoric, 
literature, sociology, every science or branch of 
knowledge which throws light upon man in any 
of his relations, stages of development, or activities, 
is drawn upon for its contribution to the science of 
pedagogy. Nothing which concerns man is foreign 
to this science. A careful reading: of books which 



336 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

treat of these various subjects, a critical observation 
of men in the ordinary walks of life, a perusal of 
the daily papers, a careful study of the children 
under your care in their ordinary work and in 
their play, noting their methods, scrutinizing their 
motives, and withal a searching analysis of the 
workings of your own minds and the action of your 
own wills, will furnish an ever-increasing store of 
fresh and interesting facts that must find a place 
in any comprehensive scheme of education that 
seeks to make the mos^ of each human soul whose 
destiny is committed to your care. These facts are 
to be sifted, analyzed, compared, and from them, by 
a painstaking induction, you are to reach your own 
conclusions. Facts you may gain from others, the 
philosophy must be your own. This is no easy 
matter. It cannot be done without labor, and it 
requires time. I believe that you are prepared to 
do this kind of work, and we shall be disappointed 
when you return to us year by year, if we do not 
find you still enthusiastic students of that science 
which Rosenkranz has taught you to love. 

Again, we expect you to be progressive. Our 
work has been that of seed-sowing. You have 
taken into willing and receptive minds great germi- 
nal truths, which are to grow and bear rich fruitage. 
At first your work will not satisfy you; it will fall 
far short of your ideals ; often it will bitterly disappoint 
you. The principles you have learned will not seem 
to apply, your methods will not work, children will 
not conform to your notions of psychology, your 



THE TEACHER'S GROWTH. 337 

apparatus will not seem to fit, and you will be in 
despair. Let me say for your encouragement that 
the most hopeless cases we send out are those who 
do their best work in their first school. Imitators 
may do well at the start, but they never do any 
better. Those who do independent work, who 
elaborate their own methods, who work not by rule 
but according to principle, learning from their fail- 
ures, adapting their work to the conditions of their 
schools and the idiosyncrasies of their pupils, who 
test everything by experience, verify all their hypoth- 
eses and modify their philosophy to conform to facts 
as they find them, those who blend profound phi- 
losophy with practical good sense, — these grow, and 
become better teachers with each succeeding year. 
Solid reputation is of slow growth, and if in ten 
years you establish a reputation as successful 
teachers, we shall be entirely satisfied. Read and 
reflect, study books and minds, let your philosophy 
be practical, and your practice philosophical. Inves- 
tigate with the humility of those who think that they 
know nothing, opening your ears to hear all voices. 
But execute your matured plans with the confidence 
of those who, feeling no misgivings of their philos- 
ophy, have confidence in themselves and faith in 
human nature. In your studies be teachable as 
children ; in your work be fearless as warriors. 
Thus will you grow in knowledge, wisdom, and 
skill. Those whom you teach will feel the quicken- 
ing influence of your presence, catch your enthu- 
siasm for truth, imitate your methods of work. 



338 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

imbibe your philosophy of life, and take on the 
stamp of your character. Your services will be in 
demand, your labors rewarded, your own self-respect 
satisfied, and your teachers, tithing your success, 
will grow rich in honors and find the reward of 
their labors. 



TRAINING FOR CITIZENSHIP. 

When you enter upon your work as teachers you 
become state officials. You have been educated by 
the State at public expense in order that you may 
be qualified to assist in training the youth of the 
State for the duties of citizenship. In addition to 
teaching the common branches of learning, you are 
to take special pains to inculcate those fundamental 
conceptions of civic virtue that will fit your pupils 
to become useful members of the State. 

What is civic virtue .? What is it to be a good 
citizen } What ideal will you hold before your 
pupils } Let me help you to answer. 

1. In the first place, the good citizen is he who by 
his intelligence and thrift is able not only to maintain 
himself, but also to add something to the general 
prosperity. There should be no drones in society. 
All should in some way be producers. You are to 
inculcate in the minds of your pupils the idea that 
nothing but inability exonerates any citizen from 
honest labor, either with hand or brain. 

2. In the next place, good citizenship requires 
that every member of the community should labor 



TRAINING FOR CITIZENSHIP. 339 

for the common good. We are all children of one 
father, joint heirs of the heritage of nature, — " earth, 
air, fire, and water," — and so intimately associated as 
to be mutually dependent upon each other. The 
State is the mother of us all and has a claim upon 
our service. The State makes wealth possible, and 
gives to life some of its greatest attractions. It has 
a right to claim from the citizen that he shall not 
simply pay his taxes and perform forced service, but 
that he shall regard it a privilege to give freely and 
voluntarily of his means for public improvements, 
highways, buildings, parks, libraries, and educational 
and charitable institutions. He is a child of the 
State, and should exhibit a filial regard for her 
welfare, honor, adornment, and progress. That 
State is poor indeed where public spirit is lacking. 

3. Again, in a republic which is a "government 
of the people, for the people, and by the people," it 
is incumbent upon every citizen to take an active, 
intelligent, honest part in political matters. To vote 
is not a privilege, a luxury, but a duty. Liberty is 
a responsibility. Every public school maintained by 
the State for the sake of the State should teach 
every boy to regard the ballot as a sacred trust which 
is to be used not for private gain, but for the public 
weal. The man who sells his vote bargains away his 
manhood. And he who corrupts the franchise by 
bribery, intimidation, or other means is a public 
enemy. To vote is a duty ; to vote wrong may be a 
blunder ; to refuse to vote at all is a crime. 

4. Another cardinal element of civic virtue is 



340 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

obedience to law. The sovereignty of the people is 
expressed in laws. To violate law is to array one's 
self against the majesty of the State. It is to be 
disloyal. It matters not what the law is, whether it 
commends itself to our judgment as wise and whole- 
some or not. So long as it stands on the statute 
books it should be obeyed. If we set it at defiance 
we ally ourselves with the criminal class as the 
enemies of order and government, and we give our 
sanction to violence and crime of every kind. We 
thus strike a blow at the foundations of society. The 
loss of respect for the throne was a precursor and a 
cause of the French Revolution. The loss of respect 
for law in our Republic will hasten the overthrow of 
our liberty. The bulwark of our liberties is in the 
loyalty of our citizens. The State looks to you to 
inculcate in the minds of its youth the loftiest 
conceptions of the majesty of law, and the most 
ardent devotion to its service by ready, constant, 
intelligent obedience to its commands. 

I charge you to ponder well this subject of 
American citizenship : reflect on the nature of the 
great experiment of freedom that is being tried on 
so vast a scale on this continent ; think what issues 
for humanity hang on the result ; consider tjhe perils 
that threaten it, and remember how great a privilege 
it is to be allowed to take an active part, however 
humble, in training multitudes of boys and girls for 
citizenship. The Republic is safe if the school- 
teachers fearlessly and intelligently do their whole 
duty. See that you do your part in sending out from 



A PROFESSIONAL SPIRIT. 34 1 

your schools those who will enter life's active duties 
with the loftiest motives of patriotism, public spirit, 
and devotion to duty. 



A PROFESSIONAL SPIRIT. 

You will illustrate your own motto, "Unity in 
diversity," for while each one of you has your own 
distinct individuality always asserting itself, you are 
nevertheless one in aim, in spirit, and in work. Not 
the least feature of our interest in you has been in 
watching the play of these two seemingly antag- 
onistic forces, selfhood and comradeship. They are 
not really antagonistic, but are complementary. 
Each needs the other. Each one of you has been 
benefited by the attrition of mind, the recognition 
of rights, the surrender of claims, the subordination 
of the individual to the common good, demanded by 
the exigencies of class association. How greatly 
you have been benefited you cannot now know, but 
in future years, when the varied experiences of life 
have given you a profounder consciousness of self 
and a broader philosophy of education, you will 
realize what the class has done for you. We are 
sorry to see this relationship, fraught with so much 
good, suddenly and forever largely broken up. 

And yet we remember that the day which dis- 
solves this class relationship substitutes for it the 
fellowship of teachers. We rejoice to welcome you 
to-day into the ancient and honorable guild of school- 
masters. Let me earnestly advise that henceforth 



342 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

you cultivate and exemplify in its highest form the 
professional spirit. Be teachers in fact, and not 
merely in name. In all the range of human activity 
there is no work more dignified than that done by 
the teacher. To be in any degree instrumental in 
the formation of exalted characters, awakening a 
love of truth, quickening the conscience, developing 
the will, fixing firmly in your minds a high ideal of 
life and setting young feet in paths of rectitude, 
stimulating the noblest desires of which the human 
heart is capable, indicating honorable ways of grat- 
ifying those desires, pointing out to the innocent 
and inexperienced the dangers and pitfalls of life, 
and in implanting such principles of conduct as 
will enable them to go on their perilous way in 
security and confidence, awakening in all a tender 
heart of pity for the lowly and unfortunate, and 
suggesting ways and means of alleviating the sorrow 
and affliction of their fellows is a part of the high 
and holy calling of the teacher. Magnify your 
office. 

Cherish the highest ideals for your own personal 
careers. Let every success but stimulate you to 
still greater efforts. Remember that you can never 
do so well that there will not remain the possibility 
of doing better. No human teacher has ever 
attained perfection. To train one's mind for its 
lifework is a task of supreme difficulty, and no one 
ever attempted it without the painful consciousness 
of partial failure. Perhaps the surest signs of 
growth in your ability to work will be the pangs of 



CHARACTER BUILDING. 343 

disappointment at your failures. Welcome criticism 
as pointing to unattained excellence, distrust praise 
as tending to deaden your efforts : read the most 
difficult books, study the highest models, subject 
your best efforts to the most rigid scrutiny, and do 
not be disappointed if your ideals always elude you. 
The caterpillar is content to crawl upon the ground 
because it has no experience of anything better; 
the eagle rests upon one mountain-top only to renew 
its strength and prepare for higher flights. 

In such work as yours there can be no absolute 
failure. Every honest effort will be fruitful of good, 
for you teach by example, and honest effort is itself 
contagious and helpful. Every impulse toward a 
better life will go on doing its work forever. One 
single lesson may arouse energies otherwise dormant 
that will accomplish marvelous things in the destiny 
of the individual. The child of poverty and obscur- 
ity that sits a humble learner at your feet may one 
day rule the nation. The destiny of the Republic 
of the future is in the hands of the school-teachers. 
You are sure of your reward. Each day's toil is 
registered in character, engraven in memory, and 
in numerous ways will enrich and bless you. 



CHARACTER BUILDING. 

Bear in mind that the chief work of the school- 
teacher is that of character building. The pupils 
committed to you are not so many pitchers to be 
filled with learning : they are moral beings to be 



344 



STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 



trained for life's duties. The knowledge which you 
impart to them is valuable chiefly as an instrument 
in developing their intellectual and moral power. 
It is of much less consequence to them and to the 
world what they learn, than it is what they become. 
They are entrusted to you not so much that they 
may be taught as that they may be trained. In after- 
life they will make very little use of the particular 
facts which they learn from you, but they will be 
called upon every day that they live to make con- 
stant use of the mental powers that have been 
developed through your agency. Their ability to 
discharge the duties that may devolve upon them 
in the various positions that they may be called 
upon to fill will depend far less upon their knowl- 
edge than upon their character. Their own personal 
well-being, their enjoyment of the blessings of life, 
their appreciation of the possibilities of living, their 
power to resist temptation, ability to cope with evil, 
susceptibility to influences for good, will result not 
so much from their knowledge as from their moral 
discipline. 

Every intelligent observer of human nature knows 
that society suffers more to-day from rascality than 
from ignorance. Defalcations in business, infidelity 
to trusts, violations of law, disturbances of the 
public peace, invasions of the sanctity of the family, 
are not faults of ignorance, but are vices. The 
widespread and fearful corruption of the ballot is 
not due to the illiteracy of those who sell their votes, 
but to the cunning knavery of unprincipled men 



CHARACTER BUILDING. 345 

who use their knowledge for base purposes. The 
State has far more to fear from the man without 
honesty than from the man without learning. Igno- 
rance is pitiful, knavery is destructive. Preparation 
for citizenship, which is the chief end for which the 
State maintains schools, is to be accomplished by 
the inculcation of right principles of action, the 
awakening of lofty desires, and the developing of 
correct habits. 

The very idea of education involves the formation 
of character. To educate is to develop ; to call into 
action latent powers ; to kindle emotions ; to form 
habits. The child cannot be educated without being 
led to discriminate truth from error, and good from 
evil. From the very nature of the case the teacher 
must make constant appeals to motives ; must excite 
the conscience and move the will. If in the daily 
work of the schoolroom the child is taught to love 
truth, to govern his actions by reason and conscience, 
his thoughts, desires, and actions will tend to the 
formation of an upright character. 

The discipline of the school, which aims primarily 
at securing good order, quiet, studiousness, fidelity, 
regularity, obedience, and other results without 
which the true ends of the school cannot be reached, 
is founded upon justice, makes use of moral means 
for the accomplishment of its ends, appeals con- 
stantly to the conscience and the reason of the 
pupil, and must result to a certain degree in the 
formation of character. 

It is not so much the teacher's duty to form right 



346 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

characters as it is his exalted privilege. The knowl- 
edge you impart may be forgotten, but the characters 
you form are largely indestructible. The work 
which surpasses all others in this world in intrinsic 
dignity, in its permanency, in its wide-reaching 
influence, in the rich results that flow out of it, is 
that of character building. You can aspire- to 
nothing higher, you can attempt nothing greater. 

The thought of this great privilege will of neces- 
sity condition all your work. In giving instruction 
your aim will be not so much to lodge facts in the 
memory as to lead your pupils to assimilate the 
truth imparted, and to form right intellectual habits. 
In appealing to motives to induce them to perform 
the allotted daily tasks you will look beyond the mere 
performance of a school duty, and will endeavor 
to touch those mainsprings of action which will fit 
them for the performance of the more important 
duties of life. Your entire system of discipline, 
while it aims at immediate results, will include in 
its scope the formation of life habits. The children 
whom you train in your little world, and who are 
occupied to-day with childish pursuits, will at no 
distant day be the men and the women who will 
bear upon their shoulders the burdens of society 
and be engaged in fighting the battles of humanity. 
Men are but children of a larger growth. The 
characters fashioned in your schoolrooms will largely 
shape their destinies and fit or unfit them for careers 
of usefulness. 

You have special facilities as teachers for doing 



CHARACTER BUILDING. 



347 



this great work. The school is a miniature world 
and tends to call into exercise, on a narrow field, 
all the motives that influence men on the larger 
field of life's activities. The growth of character 
which goes on during school life, whether you will 
it or not, takes place under your eyes and is very 
largely subject to your direction. The influences 
that are so powerful in molding character are 
largely subject to your control. It rests with you 
what motives to call into action, what ideals shall 
be presented for imitation, and what habits shall be 
formed, for you are to be masters. Not even to 
their parents do children yield themselves to be 
guided in their conduct more absolutely than to 
their teachers. To many a school boy and girl the 
teacher is more a model of imitation and an authority 
to be obeyed than is father or mother. 

The chief factor in this great work of character 
building is your own personality. The fountain 
does not rise higher than its source. What you say 
will be conditioned all the while by what you are. 
The children with whom you deal, whose characters 
you attempt to fashion, are keen observers of human 
nature, and should your own character not corre- 
spond with your precepts, they will be quick to 
discern it. They are quicker to imitate example 
than to obey rules. The best way, therefore, for 
you to lead your pupils to the formation of high 
and noble characters is for you to exhibit such a 
character before them in all your dealings with them. 
If you yourselves are enthusiastic lovers of truth, 



348 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

ardent admirers of the beautiful, conscientious in 
tlie discharge of duty, considerate of the rights of 
others, and if you seek to regulate your thoughts, 
words, and actions by the highest considerations of 
duty, your influence upon those whom you teach 
will be in the highest degree uplifting. Such as you 
are they will strive to become. 



A PLEA FOR THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 

You have been educated in the public schools, and 
the public has the right to expect that you will ever 
have a good word to say for them. In behalf of the 
free public schools of America it may be urged : — 

1. They are the poor man's friend. They bring to 
the cottage life's greatest treasures, knowledge and 
wisdom. The mass of people are and ever have been 
poor. Life for them is a struggle. Education is a 
boon because it puts the poor man's son into posses- 
sion of power. It lifts him from the low plane of 
ignorant animalism, develops his reason, and enables 
him to begin life more nearly upon terms of equality 
with the rich man's son. Education levels up. 

2. They are the rich man's opportunity. One of 
the greatest privileges of wealth is the opportunity 
to help the poor. " It is more blessed to give than 
to receive. " The best gift possible to an earnest, 
ambitious girl or boy is an education whereby he 
may help himself. The surest preventive of the 
evils of poverty is a practical education that renders 



A PLEA FOR THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 



349 



an individual independent and self-reliant. It is 
better to build schoolhouses than almshouses. There 
is no better scheme for utilizing wealth and of 
giving it the widest possible distribution than the 
public-school system. The socialism of culture is 
the panacea for nihilism and anarchy. 

3. They are the safeguards of liberty. A free 
people must be an intelligent people. Ignorance 
and freedom are incompatible. " A government of 
the people, for the people, and by the people " 
cannot be maintained long without universal educa- 
tion. The public-school system of America is the 
best means ever yet devised in the whole course of 
human history for the education of the whole people. 
They are for all — not for the few. No other system 
ever did reach the masses, and no other ever will. 
If the people are to be educated, the people must 
do it. If our Republic is to endure, it must be by 
the beneficent work of the public schools. 

4. They are the nurseries of a genuine democracy. 
They are the people's schools. In the public schools 
no caste is known, no class distinctions are recognized 
except those that arise from merit and scholarship. 
In the school all meet on a common level, rich and 
poor, high and low, the aristocrat and the pauper. 
All races, creeds, colors, and social classes enter these 
halls on the same plane. The honors are to the 
meritorious. Merit wins. Equality is the watch- 
word that is at once a spur to the rich sluggard and 
an encouragement to the humblest child of poverty. 

5. They are American. Nothing, perhaps, is so 



350 STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 

distinctively a product of the soil as is the American 
school system. In these schools all speak a common 
language ; race distinctions give way to national 
characteristics ; mutual respect and esteem take the 
place of class hatred and suspicion ; old country 
traditions are displaced by a new patriotism. The 
pupils may enter heterogeneous aliens ; they emerge 
homogeneous Americans. Individualism, freedom, 
culture, are agents of wondrous transforming power. 
6. They are training-schools of character. Abroad 
intelligence is the foundation upon which they build, 
but intelligence is only a foundation. The public 
schools foster industry, order, neatness, punctuality, 
regularity, thoroughness, respect for authority, and 
obedience to law. These are of the essentials of 
school life. They develop a love of truth for truth 's 
sake and insist on fidelity to trusts. They awaken 
self-respect, independence of thought, and beget the 
habit of regulating the life in accordance with reason 
and conscience. They call out respect for the rights 
of others, and regard not only for the rights of 
property, but also for the rights of conscience. They 
awaken love for the true, the beautiful, and the good, 
reverence for law, justice, and God. They develop 
thus robust, manly characters, and fit their students 
for lives of honor, happiness, and usefulness. 



INDEX OF PRINCIPAL SUBJECTS. 



Abstraction, 67. 

Academic work, in Normal Schools, 

306. 
Addison, 145. 
Agassiz, 139. 
Alden, 193. 
Analysis, 67 ; of the subject, 185 ; 

and synthesis, 186, 294; need of, 

187, 207. 
Ancestry, 211. 
Anderson, 5, 192, 252. 
Angelo, 194, 271. 
Anthropology, 286. 
Aristotle, 266. 
Arithmetic, method of teaching, 210, 

215 ; should secure intellectual 

discipline, 217. 
Ascham, 180. 

Athens, 194 ; temple of, 253. 
Athenian instructors, 252. 
Authority, necessity for, 172 ; blind 

submission to a bygone, 177. 

Bacon, 158. 

Beard, 42. 

Berkeley, Bishop, 268. 

Bible, 52. 

Biography, form of, 211. 

Books, value of, as testimony and as 
authority, 140; not a substitute for 
thinking, 141; training to use, 157; 
of reference, needed in every 
school, 162 ; sets of, from library, 
163. 

Brown, Dr. John, 65, 313. 

Brooks, 216. 

Calvin. 114. 

Carlyle, 158, 195, 268. 

Catiline, 115. 

Champaign, University of, exhibit 

at Chicago, 73. 
Channing, 10, 268. 
Chapel, Sistine, 195. 



Character, 330 ; building of, in Nor- 
mal School, 299; teacher's chief 
work, 343. 

Charlemagne, 317. 

Citizenship, 329 ; training for, 338. 

Classifying, 70, 207. 

Classical study, wrong method of, 
202. 

Coleridge, 252, 268. 

Colleges, 283. 

Color, 43. 45, 99. 

Cologne, Cathedral of, 39, 270. 

Columbus, 115. 

Comenius, 42, 137, 317. 

Comparison, 64, 68, 207. 

Compayre, 5, 78, 180, 200. 

Conscience, 17, 350. 

Curiosity, great value of, 132 ; dif- 
ference in, 133, 201 ; lack of, 202, 
203. 

Currie, 78, 145. 

Darling, 312. 

Dewey, 112. 

Definition, 207, 

De Graff, 216. 

De Garmo, 278. 

Demosthenes, 195. 

Description, 207. 

Development of faculties, limited, 

17- 
Dictionary, 96, 102. 
Didactics, 292, 293. 
Dickens, 312. 

Difficulties, significance of, 319. 
Drawing, 46, 72, 208. 

Economy, school, 295. 

Edgeworth, 216. 

Education, definitions of, 10, 11, 

27, 28; implies knowledge, 12; 

mental power, 14; sensibility and 

conscience, 17; a firm will, 18; 

does not create, 16: consists 



352 



STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 



often in telling, 20; common view 
of, 33 ; a lifelong process, 128 ; 
should lead to independent in- 
quiry, 212; should be many-sided, 
245 ; a complex process, 284 ; 
agencies of, 284; philosophy of, 
290; history of, 291; the new, 
316 ; old as the human race, 317 ; 
practical lower than liberal, 12; 
nature of, 13; self-, 127. 

Emerson, 158. 

Enjoyment, varies greatly, 17. 

Erasmus, 196. 

Ethics, a recitation in, 26 ; study of, 
288. 

Ethnology, 289. 

Examinations, 72, 103, 239; pur- 
poses of, 241 ; how conducted, 
247. 

Exercise, a condition of develop- 
ment, 290 ; fundamental law, 292. 

Facts, value of, 263. 

Faculties, first formed, 42 ; order of 
development of, 292. 

Family, the, 280. 

Feelings, capacity for, 82; analysis 
of, 82; index of the soul, 83; 
importance of, 84, 85 ; issue in 
action, 84; can be evoked, 87; 
tend to persist, 88; opportune 
moments for awakening, 88 ; sub- 
ject to law, 91 ; how to train, 92. 

Fitch, 278. 

Fleming, 52. 

Freiburg, the great organ of, 79. 

P'ractions, based upon division, 219 ; 
decimal, how taught, 219. 

Freedom, the goal of culture, 122; 
of child to be respected, 131; 
kindled by freedom, 168; training 
for, 169; modifies our institu- 
tions, 171 ; man's normal state, 
174. 

Froebel, 112, 217, 317, 

Fuller, 252. 

Geography, 56; furnishes material 
for language lessons, 100 ; law of 
activity in, 141. 

Generalization, 70. 

Geometry, method of study of, 23, 
24 ; law of activity in, 141. 

Gladstone, 320. 

Goethe, 112, 180. 

Goldsmith, 252. 



Gove, 240. 

Grant, General, 120, 303, 330. 

Grammar, a finishing instrument, 
96 ; technical, 102 ; learned by 
practice, 108; to be thoroughly 
studied, 108 ; should follow lan- 
guage, 137. 

Grube, 218. 

Hailman, 168. 

Hale, 31. 

Hamilton, 20, 64, 68. 

Hancock, 192. 

Harris, Dr., 168. 

Harris, W. T., 5, 112, 126, 180, 278. 

Harrison, 159. 

Helps, Arthur, 20. 

Herschel, 158. 

Hiimor, value of, 258. 

Hutten, Ulrich von, 196. 

Ideas, how awakened, 28; elements 
of knowledge, 29; " mother 
ideas," 136. 

Ideals, power of, 62; nature of, 253, 

254- 

Imagination, function of, 31; de- 
fined, 53 ; training of, 53 ; relation 
to art, 54 ; to worship, 55 ; is the 
soul, 56; handmaid of all the 
facuiiiL's, 56; how trained, 57; a 
creative power, 59; regulated by 
reason, 60 ; creates ideals, 62. 

Independence, 318. 

Incentive to study, examinations an, 
241. 

Induction, 70. 

Indians, when educated, 13; at Car- 
lisle, 153. 

Instruction, how carried on, 32. 

I n t e 1 1 e c t u a 1 i s m dry, tendency 
towards, 90. 

Jacotot, favorite theory of, 142. 
[ohnson. Dr., 268. 

Judgment, training of, 64; defined, 
69. 

Kant, 42. 

Kindergarten, trains sensibilities, 93 ; 
games of, 135; law of activi- 
ty in, 141. 

Knowledge, implied in education, 
12 ; either means or end, 12 ; how 
acquired, 22 ; has practical value, 



INDEX. 



353 



24 ; contact with things, 28 ; ele- 
ments of, 29; of material things, 
begins in sense perceptions, 30; 
relation to power, 34 ; foundation 
of, 42 ; of material things, 43 ; of 
extension, 68 ; should awaken 
emotion, 89 ; desire for, in child- 
hood, 89; not all of education, 
90 ; at first hand, 137 ; sources 
of, few, 139; not all through the 
senses, 209. 

Lalor, 252. 

Landon, definition of education, 
27, 28, 52. 

Language, power of, 25 ; should 
accompany sense training, 49; 
training in, 97; relation to 
thought, 97 ; and to business, 97 ; 
necessary to progress, 98 ; 
method of teaching, 98 ; object- 
lessons, 99; description, loo; 
compositions, 100, 104, 243 ; 
spelling, 100; reading, loi; letter- 
writing, loi ; grammar, 96, 102 ; 
dictionary, 102; rhetoric, 102; 
literature, 103 ; the classics, 104 ; 
Latin, 106 ; pupil should learn his 
own, 96. 

Laurie, 278. 

Learning, intuitive, 136 ; source of 
joy, 136 ; indifference to, 138. 

Learn, training to, 127 ; chief func- 
tion of the teacher's office, 128 ; 
first condition of, 130; second, 
132; third, 134; fourth, 136; 
fifth, 138 ; sixth, 140. 

Leonardo, 271. 

Lessing, 64. 

Lincoln, 16, 320. 

Libraries, number of, in the United 
States, 159; relations to public 
schools, 159; how to be made 
useful, 160 ; books from, 163 ; 
Providence and Worcester, 163 ; 
department of pedagogy, 165. 

Literature, influence of, loi, 103. 

Littlefield, 241. 

Locke, 96, 180, 268, 317. 

Logic, 288. 

Lombard, Peter, 205. 

Longfellow, 145. 

Lord Mayor, 192. 

Love, 252. 

Luther, 147, 300. 

Mac Donald, 52. 



Manhood, complete, sought by edu- 
cation, 18. 

Mann, Horace, 20. 

Marcel, 96. 

Memory, not learning, 30, 129; im- 
portance of, 203 ; pernicious 
habit of, 228 ; memoriter recitation, 
32, 203. 

Men, differ widely, 17. 

Method, of training the senses, 44; 
the smell, 50; the imagination, 57; 
to think, 67 ; of industrial train- 
ing, 73 ; of training the sensibili- 
ties, 92; of teaching Latin, 106; 
of training the will, 117; of 
causing to learn, 130 ; the man 
and his, 193; machine, 192; is 
applied philosophy, 195 ; no " The 
method," 196; in questioning, 
199; of teaching arithmetic, 215; 
of Socrates, 200; relation of 
logic to, 289. 

Methodology, 181 ; distinguished 
from methods, 183 ; preceded by 
logic, 184; treats of division, 
185 ; arrangement, 186 ; oral 
teaching, 189 ; of reviews, exami- 
nations, etc., 189; of educational 
values, 189 ; value of the study 
of, 190, 293. 

Metric System, how taught, 221. 

Milan, Cathedral of, 274. 

Milton, 78. 

Milne, 216. 

Moral training, 10, 18, 26, 27, 28, 35, 
38, 74, 86, 88, 94, 112, 115, 119, 
121, 131, 143, 150, 177, 314, 329, 

332, 333. 334. 339. 343. 35°- 

Montaigne, 20, 129. 

Morell, 168. 

More, Hannah, 312. 

Mowry, 5. 

Music, should be taught scientifi- 
cally, 147; training in, 147; an 
aid in government, 148 ; a means 
of physical training, 148 ; 
sweetens home life, 149; use of 
in worship, 150 ; in Germany, 150 ; 
part of a complete education, 
153 ; should be taught in child- 
hood, 155 , a culture study, 156. 

Nature, an educational force, 11 ; 

face-to-face contact with, 204. 
Nicole, 20. 
Normal School, teaching in, 142; 



354 



STUDIES IN PEDAGOGY. 



true function of, 277 ; a profession- 
al school, 286; course of study in, 
268 ; a place for character build- 
ing, 299; should be a model 
school, 299; value of, 301; aca- 
demic work in, 306; clianges in, 

307- 
Number, lessons should be language 
lessons, 99 ; method of teaching, 
217 ; philosophy of, taught by 
questions, 209. 

Obedience, inculcated, 172. 
Object-lessons, use of, 44 ; lead to 

study of nature, 46. 
Observation, 207, 208, 209 ; in 

number, 219. 

Palmer, 201. 

Parthenon, 253, 254, 255. 

Payne, Joseph, 5, 126, 192. 

Payne, "W. H., 6. 

Peaslee, 96. 

Pedagogy, 265 ; foundation of, 266 ; 

elements of, 290. 
Percentage, how taught, 224 ; unity 

of all the processes of, 228. 
Pessimist, a, unfit for school-teacher, 

259- 
Pestalozzi, 78, 136, 137 ; method 

of, 195, 312, 317. 
Pliilosophy, cannot be taught, 213 ; 

of" questioning, 214. 
Physiology, 286. 
Plato, 5, 78, 145, 169, 317. 
Porter, 64, 112. 
Principles, illustrated by simple 

examples, 219. 
Processes, taught before principles, 

220. 
Professional study, 286 ; spirit, 341. 
Prophets, schools of, 317. 
" Protest," 192. 
Psychology, 287. 

Questioning, method in, 199 ; Soc- 
rates' use of, 200 ; importance of, 
201 ; purpose of, 204, 214 ; cate- 
gories, 205 ; adapted to age and 
ability, 248. 

Quintilian, 134,317. 

Ranier, Mount, 21. 
Reasoning powers, 31. 
Reduction, how taught, 210. 



Reynolds, Sir Joshua, 268. 
Robinson, 5. 
Rosenkranz, 10, 113, 209. 
Rousseau, 6, 42, 137. 

Schools, criticism of, 34; trade, 72; 
supervision of, 73 ; dry intellect- 
ualism of, 90; religious tone of, 
94; equalize life's blessings, 151; 
milder discipline of, 169 ; prepare 
for citizenship, 172, 326, 338; 
may be self-governed, 179; ne- 
cessity for, 280, 348 ; should do 
practical work, 281; secondary, 
282 ; technical, 284 ; practice, 
297 ; public, a plea for, 348. 

Schoolmaster, the ideal, 251 ; day- 
dream of, 261. 

Sciences, 20. 

Selden, 97, 

Self-activity, 20. 

Senses, the training of, 43 ; need of 
early training, 44; purpose of, 
45 ; is mind training, 45 ; distin- 
guished from skill, 46. 

Sensibilities, training of, 79 ; analy- 
sis of, 82. 

Smell, sense of, slighted, 47 ; proper 
rank and function of, 47, 48 ; how 
trained, 49. 

Socrates, method of, 142, 194, 200 ; 
master of questioning, 205. 

Soul, has possibilities, 14; put into 
relationship with the universe, 14; 
a plan for, 40; a unit, 80; feels 
hmitations of matter, 256. 

Spencer, 126, 168. 

Square root, how taught, 220. 

State, influence of, 260. 

Stockwell, 279. 

Sully, 21, 43, 48, 64. 

Supervision, need of, 246. 

Talent, sought for, 259. 

Tarbell, 240. 

Teacher, the manner of, 11 ; should 
have a heart 92 ; should cause to 
learn, 128 ; should respect child's 
individuality, 130; should not 
tyrannize, 131 ; should strive 
after excellence in method, 196; 
qualities of, 253-275; public 
teachers, number of, 285; all 
teachers should have a pro- 
fessional training, 302; advice to 
young teachers, 311; teacher's 



INDEX. 



355 



calling, 313; benefactor of all 
classes, 314; friend of the poor, 
315 ; independence of, 318 ; special 
work of, 327; personality of, 347. 

Teaching versus training, 25 ; dig- 
nity of, 36, 313; preparation for, 
73 ; test of, 245. 

Test, in life, 34. 

Theological Seminaries, 304, 307. 

Thomas, General George H., 303. 

Thinkers, great, few, 66. 

Thinking, illustrated, 23, 24 ; de- 
pendent upon the senses, 43 ; 
function of a rational being, 65 ; 
pleasures of 65 ; complex process, 
66 ; elements of, 67 ; need of stan- 
dards, 68 ; awakened by observa- 
tion, 71 ; limited by language, 97 ; 
highest outcome of instruction 
181; should begin early, 212; 
result of, 213 ; importance of, 268 ; 
independent, 321. 

Thoroughness, promoted by exami- 
nations, 242. 

Thring, 192. 

Tools, use of, 46; may be per- 
nicious, 74. 

Tnith, search after, 64, 



Training, 19; defined, 22; object 
of, 22 ; calls powers into exercise, 
25 ; taxes all faculties, 25 ; 
awakens desires, 26 ; only a part 
of teacher's work, 27 ; no instruc- 
tion without, 28 ; prepares for 
active life, 33 ; method of 38 ; 
industrial, 72, 73, 156. (See Table 
of Contents.) 

Wayland, 10. 

Wealth, chief value of, 320. 

Weights and measures, how taught, 
210, 220. 

West Point, 303. 

Whately, 253. 

White, E. E., 112, 127, 200, 240. 

Whewell, 10. 

Will, defined, 112, 113; training of, 
113; significance of, 114; as 
force, 114; as persistence, 115; 
included in education, 17 ; exam- 
ples of, 114, 115, 116; sin of 
breaking the, 122 ; not to be sub- 
dued, 139. 

Williams, Roger, 320. 

Young, 96. 



INTRODUCTION 



TO THE BOOKS OF THE 



OLD TESTAMENT, 

With Analyses and Numerous- References to Illustrative Literature, 
BY O. S. STEARNS, D.D., 

Professor of Biblical Interpretation iti Newton Theological Institution. 



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The Social Influence of Christianity, 

WUh Special Reference to Contemporary Problems. 

By DAVID J. HILL, LL.D., President of Rochester Univ. 

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